BY PEPPER FISHER
PORT ANGELES – When a person is arrested by law enforcement, the 6th Amendment to the Constitution guarantees they will be appointed an attorney if they cannot afford one. If there is no public defender available, judges are sometimes forced to have the suspect released from custody.
That scenario is likely to become more common in the near future if the Washington State Bar Association’s request of the State Supreme Court is mandated, and the Court is expected to make a decision soon.
The public defense system in Washington is under significant strain because of what has become an exodus of experienced public defenders who are submitting their resignations. A recent survey found that the top two reasons for quitting were “low pay” and “high caseload.” Combine that with the fact that enrollment in law schools in America is down, and the Constitutional guarantee of a speedy trial sounds potentially unsustainable.
The bottom line is this; there is a very real chance that with fewer public defenders taking on fewer cases, judges and prosecutors will have no choice but to release a lot of criminal suspects because there are no public defenders available. Here’s Clallam County Prosecutor Mark Nichols on the subject.
“I’ve been trying to give this a full-court press because I believe that people really need to know about this, and the more I speak with people and they ask questions, the more engaged their becoming. My fear is that, as with so many things involving our state Supreme Court and the justice system, the public often times does not come to realize what’s happened until the dust has settled, the decisions have been made, and we’re starting to incur the real-life impacts in the aftermath.”
The proposal would cut back on public defender caseloads incrementally over three years, beginning in 2025.
Port Angeles Police Chief Brian Smith says the lion’s share of cases that will be dismissed will be property crimes, and the effects on daily life will be profound.
“Crisis would would be a mild term. You can’t decriminalize two-thirds of, or three-quarters of the work that we do and tell the public we don’t prosecute property crime. We don’t prosecute most of the crimes now that get prosecuted. And what I mean by that is, we won’t have civil society as you know it now. Law enforcement will still make arrests, will still respond, will still investigate. But when you don’t charge what is otherwise a very chargeable case, the people that suffer are the victims. Nothing like it, to my knowledge, has ever happened in the US. I can’t imagine living here under that.”
Smith says the Association of Washington Cities has said they are extremely concerned about this issue, and the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs has also testified against the proposal as written.
Prosecutor Nichols says Clallam County is already dealing with a shortage of attorneys, and he believes that if the proposal is made law and the reduction in caseloads begins next year, we could begin to see accused criminals set free.
“What I want to avoid is what’s already happening in counties like Benton and Yakima. And they’re dealing with situations where there’s people who’ve been arrested by law enforcement, are referred for a class A violent felony, they are charged, there’s no defense attorney available, and so, not only are they not being held on bail, those cases are being dismissed in some cases. Worst case scenario, after 10 to 14 days or so.”
We first covered this story in July, just before the public comment period began. That window is about to close, but it’s not too late to weigh in. You have until October 31.
Send comments by email to supreme@courts.wa.gov or by mail to P.O. Box 40929, Olympia, WA 98504-0929.
Email comments should be limited to 1,500 words,