Well, thought I'd give blogging a try because us public defenders get such a bad rap. A woman in court actually referred to her attorney as her "public offender". How many times have I had a client ask me: "Are you an attorney or a public defender"? I think alot of this bad rap is based on the my cousin vinny movie where the pd was portrayed as a stuttering moron. Here's the real scoop: I was in private practice for about 15 years when I joined the pd's office about three years ago. I've never met such a bright and devoted and hardworking set of attorneys in my life...dealing with what I believe the most important thing in life is...personal liberty. Our job is to protect and help our folks from arbitrary, capricious and sometimes just plain mean and undeserving actions by the prosecutorial ilk.
Today I saw a client in jail. She has seven kids. I represent her on a superior court matter (shoplifting) and found out today that a municipal court judge threw her in jail based on unpaid fines...about 750 bucks from some prior minor offense. She doesn't even get her arraignment date until mid-January. For fines! Unreal. Some folks are not lucky enough or fortunate enough to have any $$ or any source to borrow it from. Imagine being thrown in the can and locked up from mid-November through mid-January because you can't come up with 10% of $750 bucks. Granted, she pled guilty in superior court for shoplifting, but she shoplifted children's clothing from walmart for her kids. Is this Jean Valjean of 2008 stealing the loaf of bread? Its heartbreaking.
Another client pled out to possession of cds (weed) which was his first "felony" (called "crime" where I practice) in order to take the rap for his illegal immigrant best friend to whom I think the weed truly belonged to. Had his best friend illegal immigrant pled out, back to Afghanistan for him. I disagreed with his decision, made that clear, but his friendship was more important to him. Hmmm.
These are some of the folks we represent. They are human beings, with familys of their own, with feelings and thoughts. They are not hardened criminals. They are people and we shouldn't forget them.
Well thats only 2 of about 10,000 things I did today. Welcome to my world!
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