Can An Attorney Handle More Than 100 Cases At A Time?
Can An Attorney Handle More Than 100 Cases At A Time?
In this podcast episode Jeff Esparza is a public defender talking about his cases that he deals with day to day. He resides in Kansas City, Missouri where it has the busiest public defenders offices and the fifth highest murder rate in 2017. A sixty hour week for Jeff would be considered modest, and that just indicates how heavy his work load is when dealing with these cases. Jeff expresses his fear of letting things slip through the crack and may not be able to present all facts relevant to a case to help the defender. The reality is that there are too many clients and not enough attorneys. The slang term for public defenders is public pretender due to the fact that they may not contribute much to the case and or even help a defendant in their case.
If you can’t afford an attorney one will be provided to you, which in some states may require a 12,000 $ income or less or in other states be double the amount of yearly income. That is a prerequisite you must qualify for in order to have an attorney provided to you. Kevin Shepherd is an example of the failed public defender system in which he waited several months in jail before ever meeting his public defender. He could not make bail, but also he did not have the money to afford a private lawyer to help diminish the bail amount. In doing so, Kevin was forced to sit in jail and wait for an attorney. Kevin was in jail for 2 months before Jeff was trying to examine his case, and was not able to be released from jail. It took 118 days for Kevin to be released from jail and to come out on the other side and have no job or home. Furthermore, Kevin later died from sickness when his case charges were dropped which would essentially seal the deal on that case.
There is a national epidemic for underfunding public defenders, in which there are too many cases and unjust incarcerations occurring particularly with african americans. Guilty or innocent, still entitles a person to have the right to an attorney in which a case must go to trial. However, justice can not be served if the case is never attended too or lack of defenders available. In order to understand the huge weight a public defender must bear I will reference a reading to illustrate another point paramount to this discussion. Taken from chapter 2 in (Edelman, 2017), the situation described by the author in which a man named Thomas Harvey is interning at a public defender office showcases the reality of their job. Harvey explains how he has seen daily the african americans in orange jumpsuits appearing in court for minor misdemeanors and were treated as “not human beings”(Edelman, 2017). Harvey argues that the courts prey on black people and homeless people and is an example of systematic racism which needs to be abolished (Edelman, 2017). The solution he proposes is a full time professional court system in the region to fulfill the demand of cases awaiting a hearing.
Public Defenders are what keep the poor and homeless from becoming nothing but a statistic in the criminal justice system. They are client centered, supposed to operate legally and effectively, and to defend those who are guilty to the very end. One might say that public defenders take all the work load and do everything, but when overburdened what happens? Facts slip through the cracks, people go to prison, people never leave jail, and other vicious scenarios may occur. In addition to this harsh reality, according to (Edelman, 2017) public defenders are the first line of defense in protecting low income people from expensive fines and fees. This indicates that at least public defenders try to help avert some injustices that the prosecution may throw at the defendant.
I recommend listening to this podcast episode because of the way public defenders are portrayed. In some cases, the public defender is seen as a puppet or a pretender as some people may state. There seems to be a huge need for public defenders and almost a shortage of the quality kind of public defenders available to combat injustices to all kinds of people. Furthermore I encourage anyone to listen to this podcast if one wishes to expand on the type of reality some professionals experience in the realm of law. Media coverage and television shows have greatly influenced what we think happens in the criminal justice system in which I was once a part of that false notion. This podcast episode has really opened my eyes to the reality of not being able to serve justice properly in the court system.
References
Broken Justice. (2019, October 29). Retrieved October 09, 2020, from https://www.pbs.org/newshour/podcasts/broken-justice
Edelman, P. B. (2017). Book Group Bag: Not a crime to be poor: The criminalization of poverty in America. New York: The New Press.