Lawyer Draft Gets Sluggish Response; But Judge Still Trying to Lure Defenders

November 19, 2007
Times-Picayune (LA)
By Susan Finch


Orleans Parish Criminal District Court Judge Arthur Hunter's first attempt to draft private civil attorneys to help the city's underfunded and overburdened public defender office posted a success rate of slightly more than 50 percent Friday morning.

Out of 33 lawyers notified last month that they'd been appointed to represent a poor defendant in Hunter's Section K court, 17 showed up as ordered to accept or beg off the assignment, the judge said.

Of the 17 lawyers who answered Hunter's call Friday, three filed motions to withdraw; one said he has no secretary or other staff to assist him. Others asked to be reimbursed for fees or expenses for doing indigent defense work, Hunter said.

Among the lawyers who agreed to take cases that Hunter assigned were Joe Peiffer and Lance McCardle of the Correro, Fishman civil law firm. Both said they'd work for free.

"I think all lawyers have an obligation to do pro bono work," Peiffer said.

The 16 lawyers who didn't show up to answer Hunter's summons are not off the hook, the judge said.

"I will have my law clerk make phone calls to find out why they didn't show up, and I'll go from there, depending on the reasons," Hunter said.

Meanwhile, Chief Orleans Public Defender Christine Lehmann said Friday that the response to Hunter's initial batch of appointment letters shows that relying on the private bar to fill gaps in the public defender ranks won't work.

Giving her office more money to beef up its staff of lawyers would be more efficient and cheaper than paying private lawyers by the hour, she said.

The names of the 33 attorneys due to report to Hunter's court on Friday were drawn from a list of 57 volunteer lawyers filed with the public defender's office.

Starting Monday, the other 24 lawyers on the list of volunteers will be sent notices that they've been assigned a criminal case and are to report to Hunter's courtroon on Nov. 30.

Going into the Friday session, Hunter said, he really had no expectations about how many of the civil lawyers he summoned would accept their appointments. "I was just hoping that many of them would appear, but we've still got a ways to go," he said.

Starting after Thanksgiving, Hunter will begin sending appointment letters to 50 lawyers who have not volunteered for indigent defender duty. The 50, who will be told to show up in Hunter's court Dec. 7, are on a list supplied by the Louisiana State Bar Association. Hunter said he thinks that enlisting the "non-volunteer" lawyers will be difficult.

Hunter's bid to get the private bar to help handle cases of poor defendants is the latest development in his campaign to focus attention on a public defender system he says has too many clients and not enough money or time to defend them adequately.

Last spring, after that office cited inadequate funding and withdrew from representing about 140 low-income clients, Hunter called a halt to prosecution of dozens of defendants who didn't have lawyers and ordered the release, pending trial, of any who remained in jail.

But in August the state 4th Circuit Court of Appeal reversed Hunter, telling him to do what it said he should have already done: appoint counsel for any defendants who don't have lawyers and hold bond modification hearings before approving release of any incarcerated defendants.

Hunter maintains he is complying with the appeals court's demand by trying to enlist assistance from private lawyers.

Hunter acknowledged last month that appointing private lawyers comes with its own set of difficulties. He said feedback from most of 400 attorneys he has surveyed indicated that they don't practice criminal law and fear doing so would amount to malpractice or ineffective assistance of counsel.

Indeed, one of the civil lawyers who won Hunter's OK on Friday to withdraw from his indigent defense appointment told the judge it would be a disservice for him to represent an indigent client because he has no secretary or support staff to assist him.

"Sounds like the public defender's office, doesn't it?" Hunter said in an interview later Friday.

Hunter said paying the private attorneys who don't agree to work for free is another problem. Both the New Orleans and state public defender agencies have told him their budgets can't cover such costs.

Hunter said the entire situation results from the Legislature's failure to adequately fund the public defender program.


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