The caseload for the Cole County Public Defenders Office is at a point where something needs to be done to make sure clients are given adequate representation, Cole County Presiding Judge Pat Joyce said Tuesday.
How to remedy the matter is yet to be determined.
Joyce made her finding Tuesday after a motion was filed by lead public defender Justin Carver, asking the judge to appoint an outside attorney in the case of Quntien Williams, a Jefferson City man charged with one count of second-degree domestic assault in July.
Carver's area covers Cole, Miller and Moniteau counties. Attorneys within the district are "overburdened with cases," he testified.
Carver said several options could be considered under state law, including bringing in lawyers outside of the public defender system. He noted the state of Missouri employs a significant number of lawyers, such as those who work for the various departments, agencies and legislative research. Carver also suggested the court could appoint a private attorney, which he said has happened in a few cases already in Cole County.
Now that Joyce has made her decision, Cole County Prosecutor Mark Richardson said another hearing must be held, as required by law, to allow his office to give their responses for what should be done.
Carver had objected to Richardson being allowed to be in the hearing, believing he would have an unfair influence on choices of legal representation. But Joyce overruled the objection, and Richardson cited a state statute which he said required his office to be involved in the process.
Missouri's public defender system began in 1972 as the state's response to a 1965 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that found the federal Constitution's 6th Amendment right to counsel includes poor people who can't pay for their own attorney.
In Missouri, the public defender's office is appointed to a criminal case only when there's a possibility of a jail or prison sentence and the defendant can't afford to hire a lawyer. Historically, the system's attorneys have had a large caseload and constant turnover.
The majority of Tuesday's 1-hour hearing had Carver and Michael Barrett, director of the Missouri State Public Defender System, testifying about the high caseload not only in Cole County, but throughout the state.
Using a formula based on a caseload study done in 2014, Barrett said, it was found at that time they needed another 270 public defenders across the state to give competent defense to clients.
"Using that same formula on our current caseload, we'd need 300 additional defenders," Barrett said. "Right now, we have 370 defenders, but we have a 25 percent turnover rate. In the Jefferson City office, we are 220 percent over capacity, which is about what most of the 33 offices in the state are at. We have three offices at 300 percent, and the best office is probably St. Louis City at 160 percent."
Barrett said he gave Carver permission to ask for relief and has also granted the heads of public defender offices in Kansas City, Harrisonville, Rolla and Chillicothe to do so.
Carver, who came to the Jefferson City office at the end of 2014, said at the end of 2016 his junior lawyers came to him and said they'd quit if something wasn't done about the caseload. He said he agreed, and since then, they have been making more motions asking outside council be appointed.
"We lost five lawyers last year," he said. "I'm supposed to have seven, and we're up to six now. But we still have an opening because one of my staff is out on military leave and won't be back until next summer. I'm also supposed to have an investigator, but that person is also out on a leave of absence so the other lawyers and our support staff are trying to fill in as best as they can."
In Miller County, Carver said, he has continually filed motions to have other attorneys take cases, but the judges there have consistently ruled against those motions. Therefore, he is taking those cases, which he estimated as totaling 220 as of Tuesday.
"I can't give competent representation with that caseload," he told Joyce. "I have no time to go to the jail to talk with clients. They deserve a thorough representation."
Tuesday's hearing comes in the wake of a Missouri Supreme Court decision earlier this year to punish a public defender. The court decided to put Karl Hinkebein's law license on probation for a year due to his lack of communication with several clients over several years.
In Boone County, Presiding Judge Kevin Crane ordered private attorneys to take cases the public defender would otherwise handle. Public defenders there requested judges stop appointing them to cases due to fears of disbarment.
Joyce set a hearing for next week with Carver and Richardson to continue to work on some type of solution.