Friday, April 11, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Public defender fee plan to be floated

Proposal follows report on workload levels, poor training

Criminal defendants who are poor might be charged for legal services to help cover costs at the financially crippled Clark County Public Defender's Office.

County administrators next week are expected to give a report to the County Commission on the possibility of charging public defender clients who are poor but still can afford to pay something for their legal defense.

Public Defender Marcus Cooper said some jurisdictions in other states for years have charged a fee, but that he is looking for direction from the County Commission before moving forward with any proposal.

"We are not trying to prevent anyone from being represented who really needs it and can't afford it," Cooper said. "There are a number of clients who are indigent but also have an ability to contribute."

In some states, clients who can afford to contribute to their defense are charged fees ranging from $10 to $100.

The proposal goes to the commission two weeks after an outside analysis of the county Public Defender's Office found that for years heavy workloads and poor training and accountability have compromised the legal defense provided to the poor.

The review, which was done by the Legal Aid & Defender Association, states that lawyers in the office are saddled with workloads double the national standard, and that there are so many juvenile cases that lawyers devote an average of only two hours to each case.

Frannie Forsman, the federal public defender for Nevada and a finalist for Cooper's job two years ago, and Gary Peck, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, said it's unfortunate that Clark County's first step in addressing a litany of deficiencies is to consider charging clients.

"That office is dysfunctional and already failing to meet its constitutional obligations," Peck said. "I am astonished at even the suggestion that the best place to start is by charging poor people for services that are obviously inadequate."

Cooper said he's not recommending that clients pay a fee, and that he first discussed the possibility of charging clients long before the Legal Aid & Defender Association report was released.

"By no means is this the answer to the concerns raised in the report. It's just one ingredient we can deploy," Cooper said.

The office has 69 attorneys including Cooper, but needs 55 more to bring each lawyer's workload down to the national standard of 150 cases per year.

From 1993 to 2001, the number of new juvenile cases increased more than 379 percent while staffing stayed the same, the report said. At the end of 2001, each attorney for juvenile cases was handling 950 cases per year.

Meanwhile, the county's revenues are not meeting expectations, and all county departments combined are requesting 816 new positions at a cost of $50 million for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

The concept of charging clients for indigent legal services was proposed first in 1967 by the President's Crime Commission. Charging a fee was first authorized by the National Advisory Commission on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals in 1973, according to a second report released Thursday from the National Legal Aid & Defender Association.

A look at fees and revenues in states that charge clients who are poor but able to contribute to part of their legal defense.

State	Fee	Annual revenue
Arkansas	$10-$100	$174,412
Connecticut	$25	$83,000
Delaware	$50	$210,601
Florida	$40	$2.5 million
Massachusetts	$100	$2.4 million
New Mexico	$10	$106,960
New Jersey	$50	$226,534
South Carolina	$25	$188,776

SOURCE: American Bar Association 2001 Public Defender Up-Front Application Fees Update