5:24 "Now, let me explain to you how *the system* works..." When you hear an attorney talking to you like you are a child, you know you are about to hear something other than what is factually true.
This is why people don't want public defenders. Not because the lawyers aren't as educated and good as others but because its known that their case isn't going to be handled properly.
Sooooooo in response to an attorney saying she is drowning in 500 cases... They gave her 150 more. Geee... I wonder why people would leave? Lets have a big think. 🤔 It's almost like Georgia should audit this office and figure out where the money is going or determine if they really do need more money and allocate it accordingly.
When will the government be held accountable here? Every State Bar has a 50+ page of ethics and rules that lawyers must follow. Many of those rules are principled on the avoidance of professional negligence. Under basic employment law, the public defenders office should be held accountable for having PD's attain a manageable load of cases that are in sync with state bar rules of professional conduct. Every public defense agency out there dealing with this issue is forcing their PD's to break their state bar rules of professional conduct. Every state bar is a government-derived entity. Government is responsible here. Each politician is responsible. The judges are responsible for holding attorney's accountable, and, vicariously, holding the office of public defender's accountable. At times, public defense offices are negligent when they do not allow their PD's to officially deny new cases based on these professional rules. That is negligence. So, yes, politicians are responsible, every state is responsible, but it is also status quo public defense offices that are responsible. If government holds the citizenry accountable to their multitude of codes, statutes, and laws, when will government be held accountable to the same standard?
They just need to start dismissing cases then since the PD office are so overwhelmed with cases that means those sitting in jail are going to receive ineffective counsel that will lead to unjust convictions
From the Georgia Public Defender webpage: "Executive Director Alli is a recipient of the 2018 Community Partner Spirit of the League Award from the Greater Atlanta Urban League and the 2019 Daily Reports Trailblazer Award. Her vision and strategic focus have enabled her to skillfully build critical infrastructures, integrate best practices, and spearhead high-profile projects that have produced transformational results for constituents."
Holy shit the judge was just like we know we’re fucking up and they’ll let you ride. You can call So and So to and tell them. How in the world is he still a judge after that being on camera it doesn’t even make sense he literally admitted to violating his rights ha ha oh my God.
Fairly easy to solve. Just hire more lawyers, lowering standards. Make it possible within current budgets by lowering public defender pay, (average pay in Georgia is $61K). There are more than enough underemployed lawyers who are making as much or less than they would as PD with reduced pay. Probably many lawyers would accept being paid less so they can have actual legal experience. Thus would result in worse quality PDs, but this would be made up by each having a lower case load. Aren’t I so smart?
Even if we assume that the PDs are 'worse quality', the extent to which that is true would still be up for debate as surely a less than 'elite' quality lawyer who has the ability to spend a sufficient amount of time per case to put forward their best effort would likely be able to provide far better representation than an 'elite' lawyer who only has an hour or less to work on each case (as is the case for many PDs). Even if the lawyers are paid less, this can be compensated for by lowering the cost of law school and making it more accessible as has been done by schools like CUNY Law, a school that focuses on public interest and produces many public defenders roughly making around $60-70k, but their tuition is super cheap for in-state residents at around $16k vs $60k+ at most private law schools. And it's also not just the lawyers themselves that need more funding or that we need more of them, it's also all of the support staff and resources they lack that are often available to prosecutors.
@@StringzOfFury Yeah, I'm pretty sure this just rephrases what I said. There's no need at the present time for that: there are more than enough lawyers produced each year and now underemployed to meet the need for public defenders. Maybe. This solution just fixes the deficiency of public defenders.
@@Manx123 Yeah, it rephrases it in a way that focuses on the benefits rather than having 'worse quality' PDs. There absolutely is a need for more affordable and accessible education, especially when it comes to law school and for those who want to be PDs. Many of the unemployed lawyers would not want to be public defenders because they are burdened with tons of debt and the already lackluster pay of PDs makes that career choice financially not practical. Creating more public law schools which focus on public interest and are much more affordable makes it a more practical career option for a far greater number of people, and is a much more efficient use of capital to educate a society vs funneling disgusting amounts of money into these 'elite' private schools that do not necessarily have the interest of the general public in mind. I for one, as a resident of NY who isn't from a particularly wealthy family, would not even be able to consider the possibility of being a Public Defender or lawyer at all if not for the existence of a place like CUNY Law, as I would never want to expose myself to the risk of having $100k-200k of student debt that can't ever go away even with bankruptcy or of being locked into a certain career just to pay off that debt. Is 'fixing the deficiency of public defenders' not the entire point? As I already mentioned, these are luxuries already afforded to most prosecutors.
@@StringzOfFuryOkay, I looked into it, and I see that my proposal really isn't that good. The employment situation for recent law school graduates is much better than I thought, so there's not much room to low-ball BAR passers. The issue is that, while there are thousands of unemployed/underemployed law school graduates, I think, (easily findable data out there doesn't indicate explicitly this), they overlap well with those who failed to pass the BAR, the passage of which is required to be a public defender. So, something as radical as your proposal is needed, but it's really not enough, considering how many law students there are who fail to pass the BAR. CUNY Law looks like it does do much better than the median. However, the median debt for its graduates is $86K, which, along with the time-commitment and work involved, is still way too much for public defenders. There's only going to be so much money for public defenders in a state, and demanding so much from them individually in terms of qualifications limits their supply, so each has can't give decent work. The best solution, given limitations of resources, is less qualified people doing more of the work. However, the entire legal class would fight this, so it's not feasible unless public defender case loads are manage better, and there are other areas of society where approach of shifting workloads to the less qualified would be more beneficial, (e.g. physicians).
@@StringzOfFury Unemployed lawyers are those who go to garbage bottom ranked law schools. Even getting a job as a PD or prosecutor is hard in those types, depending on the jurisdiction. Getting six figure legal jobs is rare. Also, state and local PD's and Prosectors are the ones paid poorly which leads to high turnover. Federal PDs and prosecutors get paid a lot more. That's why those offices hire experienced lawyers, many also have judicial clerkships. I hope to get into white collar criminal defense, but have researched this topic. I think that the legal education and higher education generally should be more affordable. I think that schools like the one you mentioned, however, like CUNY need to be shut down. Lower-ranked law schools have poor, if not terrible ABA data.
I would've guessed a public defender would have at any one given time 20-30 cases they were working but 687 is CRAZY .
5:24 "Now, let me explain to you how *the system* works..." When you hear an attorney talking to you like you are a child, you know you are about to hear something other than what is factually true.
Narcissists gotta gaslight. 😐
This is why people don't want public defenders. Not because the lawyers aren't as educated and good as others but because its known that their case isn't going to be handled properly.
Sooooooo in response to an attorney saying she is drowning in 500 cases...
They gave her 150 more. Geee... I wonder why people would leave? Lets have a big think. 🤔
It's almost like Georgia should audit this office and figure out where the money is going or determine if they really do need more money and allocate it accordingly.
If they have more fair trials they won’t make enough off of us in the private prison systems
When will the government be held accountable here? Every State Bar has a 50+ page of ethics and rules that lawyers must follow. Many of those rules are principled on the avoidance of professional negligence. Under basic employment law, the public defenders office should be held accountable for having PD's attain a manageable load of cases that are in sync with state bar rules of professional conduct. Every public defense agency out there dealing with this issue is forcing their PD's to break their state bar rules of professional conduct. Every state bar is a government-derived entity. Government is responsible here. Each politician is responsible. The judges are responsible for holding attorney's accountable, and, vicariously, holding the office of public defender's accountable. At times, public defense offices are negligent when they do not allow their PD's to officially deny new cases based on these professional rules. That is negligence. So, yes, politicians are responsible, every state is responsible, but it is also status quo public defense offices that are responsible. If government holds the citizenry accountable to their multitude of codes, statutes, and laws, when will government be held accountable to the same standard?
They just need to start dismissing cases then since the PD office are so overwhelmed with cases that means those sitting in jail are going to receive ineffective counsel that will lead to unjust convictions
Why dont they offer loan forgivness for law school loans? Its a public job.
PDs get PSLF but that ten years away. And that doesn’t apply to private loans
From the Georgia Public Defender webpage:
"Executive Director Alli is a recipient of the 2018 Community Partner Spirit of the League Award from the Greater Atlanta Urban League and the 2019 Daily Reports Trailblazer Award. Her vision and strategic focus have enabled her to skillfully build critical infrastructures, integrate best practices, and spearhead high-profile projects that have produced transformational results for constituents."
Madame director is 100% at fault. Wonder how much she's getting paid. Wonder if her office has pens, paper, a functioning door?
I want to be a white collar criminal defense attorney. I would say that Federal PDs have no crisis.
Holy shit the judge was just like we know we’re fucking up and they’ll let you ride. You can call So and So to and tell them. How in the world is he still a judge after that being on camera it doesn’t even make sense he literally admitted to violating his rights ha ha oh my God.
Moral of the story. Don’t live in Georgia.
Fairly easy to solve. Just hire more lawyers, lowering standards. Make it possible within current budgets by lowering public defender pay, (average pay in Georgia is $61K). There are more than enough underemployed lawyers who are making as much or less than they would as PD with reduced pay. Probably many lawyers would accept being paid less so they can have actual legal experience.
Thus would result in worse quality PDs, but this would be made up by each having a lower case load.
Aren’t I so smart?
Even if we assume that the PDs are 'worse quality', the extent to which that is true would still be up for debate as surely a less than 'elite' quality lawyer who has the ability to spend a sufficient amount of time per case to put forward their best effort would likely be able to provide far better representation than an 'elite' lawyer who only has an hour or less to work on each case (as is the case for many PDs).
Even if the lawyers are paid less, this can be compensated for by lowering the cost of law school and making it more accessible as has been done by schools like CUNY Law, a school that focuses on public interest and produces many public defenders roughly making around $60-70k, but their tuition is super cheap for in-state residents at around $16k vs $60k+ at most private law schools.
And it's also not just the lawyers themselves that need more funding or that we need more of them, it's also all of the support staff and resources they lack that are often available to prosecutors.
@@StringzOfFury Yeah, I'm pretty sure this just rephrases what I said.
There's no need at the present time for that: there are more than enough lawyers produced each year and now underemployed to meet the need for public defenders.
Maybe. This solution just fixes the deficiency of public defenders.
@@Manx123 Yeah, it rephrases it in a way that focuses on the benefits rather than having 'worse quality' PDs.
There absolutely is a need for more affordable and accessible education, especially when it comes to law school and for those who want to be PDs. Many of the unemployed lawyers would not want to be public defenders because they are burdened with tons of debt and the already lackluster pay of PDs makes that career choice financially not practical. Creating more public law schools which focus on public interest and are much more affordable makes it a more practical career option for a far greater number of people, and is a much more efficient use of capital to educate a society vs funneling disgusting amounts of money into these 'elite' private schools that do not necessarily have the interest of the general public in mind. I for one, as a resident of NY who isn't from a particularly wealthy family, would not even be able to consider the possibility of being a Public Defender or lawyer at all if not for the existence of a place like CUNY Law, as I would never want to expose myself to the risk of having $100k-200k of student debt that can't ever go away even with bankruptcy or of being locked into a certain career just to pay off that debt.
Is 'fixing the deficiency of public defenders' not the entire point? As I already mentioned, these are luxuries already afforded to most prosecutors.
@@StringzOfFuryOkay, I looked into it, and I see that my proposal really isn't that good. The employment situation for recent law school graduates is much better than I thought, so there's not much room to low-ball BAR passers. The issue is that, while there are thousands of unemployed/underemployed law school graduates, I think, (easily findable data out there doesn't indicate explicitly this), they overlap well with those who failed to pass the BAR, the passage of which is required to be a public defender.
So, something as radical as your proposal is needed, but it's really not enough, considering how many law students there are who fail to pass the BAR. CUNY Law looks like it does do much better than the median. However, the median debt for its graduates is $86K, which, along with the time-commitment and work involved, is still way too much for public defenders.
There's only going to be so much money for public defenders in a state, and demanding so much from them individually in terms of qualifications limits their supply, so each has can't give decent work.
The best solution, given limitations of resources, is less qualified people doing more of the work. However, the entire legal class would fight this, so it's not feasible unless public defender case loads are manage better, and there are other areas of society where approach of shifting workloads to the less qualified would be more beneficial, (e.g. physicians).
@@StringzOfFury Unemployed lawyers are those who go to garbage bottom ranked law schools. Even getting a job as a PD or prosecutor is hard in those types, depending on the jurisdiction. Getting six figure legal jobs is rare. Also, state and local PD's and Prosectors are the ones paid poorly which leads to high turnover. Federal PDs and prosecutors get paid a lot more. That's why those offices hire experienced lawyers, many also have judicial clerkships. I hope to get into white collar criminal defense, but have researched this topic. I think that the legal education and higher education generally should be more affordable. I think that schools like the one you mentioned, however, like CUNY need to be shut down. Lower-ranked law schools have poor, if not terrible ABA data.
I met a lawyer who was a contractor lawyer who was fired after he ask where his payment was and is now suing the public defenders office here in az