Public Defenders Inept; State Pay Too Low for Good Court-Appointed Attorneys

September 10, 2007
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
By Christopher Hill

Whenever athletes are looking to renegotiate their contracts and say, "it's not about the money," it's usually about the money. When Chris Adams resigned as director of the Georgia Capital Defender's Office 11 days ago, it was also about the money.

The Georgia Public Defender Standards Council, which funds Adams' office, was created four years ago to ensure indigent defendants receive zealous and qualified representation. But in his resignation letter, Adams said his office could not provide the representation its clients deserved with only a $4.3 million budget — less than half of what was requested from the Defender Council.

Unfortunately, this situation is not isolated. Defendants in capital trials are constitutionally entitled to, and are in desperate need of, qualified counsel. Virtually all cannot afford to hire attorneys and must turn to public defenders or court-appointed attorneys, both of whom are funded by the state. Public defenders are almost always overworked and underfunded. Court-appointed attorneys are almost always grossly underpaid and often unqualified to take on capital cases.

Unfortunately, these deficiencies almost invariably result in substandard representation. Inadequate representation for a capital client can be deadly. The American Bar Association issued guidelines that define adequate counsel in capital cases, including performance standards, level of expertise, investigation responsibilities and client contact, among other important criteria. The U.S. Supreme Court has cited these guidelines on a number of occasions.

The Texas State Bar, Alabama Circuit Court Judges Conference and Arizona Supreme Court have adopted substantial parts or all of these guidelines. Indeed, the Georgia Public Defender Council has also adopted most of the standards; however, adopting the standards is not enough. Compliance with these standards depends on adequate funding.

A legion of indigent capital defendants have lost their lives or almost lost their lives because of abysmal legal representation at their trials. In 1995, Carl Johnson was executed in Texas after a trial at which his court-appointed lawyer literally slept on the job. Kenneth Foster, who recently had his sentence commuted in Texas, was represented by a court-appointed lawyer who failed to bring up his troubled childhood as a mitigating factor in his case.

In an Oklahoma case, Ronald Williamson was sentenced to death after his court-appointed attorney, who was poorly compensated, did not present evidence that another person confessed to the crime. The charges against Williamson were later dismissed. And in California, Manny Babbitt, a Vietnam veteran suffering with severe mental illness, was sentenced to death after his court-appointed lawyer drank four martinis at lunch every day during his trial. Babbitt was executed in 1999.

Georgia's death penalty history has been plagued with death sentences as a result of poor defense lawyering. Before the U.S. Supreme Court held that executing mentally retarded inmates was unconstitutional, Jerome Holloway and William Alvin Smith were sentenced to death after their court-appointed attorneys did not or could not bring up their mental deficiencies.

Even supporters of the death penalty have opposed the execution of Troy Davis, an inmate on Georgia's death row, due to a lack of evidence against him. What Davis did not receive was a competent court-appointed trial attorney who should have investigated testimony against him that was allegedly coerced by the police. If that was not bad enough for Davis, when he finally obtained competent counsel for his appeal, the federal government drastically cut the funding for the Georgia Resource Center, which was handling the case.

Defendants are fighting for their lives during capital trials. The Constitution guarantees effective lawyers and a fair trial — that means lawyers with the time, resources and skill to properly represent them. It also means expert assistance, access to technology and investigators. All of this costs money. As things now stand, adequate resources are sorely lacking in many parts of the country. As a result, the death penalty is too often reserved not for the "worst" offenders, but for those defendants with the worst lawyers.

Chris Adams wants Georgia to provide better representation to its capital defendants. He can no longer participate in a system that fails to protect the rights of defendants. For Georgia to give capital defendants a constitutionally adequate defense, it has to realize that, in large part, it is about the money.


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