Opinion: Public defender office not 'public pretenders' anymore
You may not realize it, but your local public defender office is making a big difference in the lives of people in Hamilton County. Over the past 10 years, we’ve taken intentional steps to shed the derogatory image of "public pretenders." Admittedly, our "public pretender" reputation was earned, but we’re not that office anymore. The Law Office of the Hamilton County Public Defender protects the rights of ordinary citizens every day.
March 18 is the 60th anniversary of Gideon v. Wainwright, which is the landmark United States Supreme Court case that found that all people facing the possibility of being jailed have the right to an attorney, regardless of their ability to afford one. The public defender’s office is entrusted to protect this important constitutional right by providing lawyers to all people charged with crimes who cannot otherwise afford a lawyer.
Clients who come to us often have reservations because they haven’t chosen to hire us. We empower our lawyers to be the lawyer their client would choose every time. We do this through our recruiting and training program, the services our clients receive, the way we support our attorneys, and our community work.
We’ve worked hard to make the Law Office of the Hamilton County Public Defender a desirable place to work. Top law students from all over the country join our office each fall. They come here to make a difference in the lives of the clients we defend.
Last year, two years after our training program took affect and when the pandemic started to ease, we gathered some data on our performance. We found from Oct. 1, 2021 to Oct. 31, 2022 our municipal lawyers, which represents one of our five legal divisions, had 16 jury trial wins, 55 motions to mitigate sentences granted, and 144 bench trial wins.
However, our office’s mission is not to win trials, but to improve our community by empowering our clients. We seek to work ourselves out of a job by breaking the cycle of poverty by providing our clients with services they need to be reestablished in our community. We have a social work division that connects our clients with drug treatment, mental health treatment, housing, rides to court, childcare, and jobs. The services we are able to obtain for our clients continue, no matter the outcome of their case.
Besides our courtroom advocacy, we’ve worked hard to become a community law office that proactively defends our citizens and collaborates on projects that make the criminal system more equal, accessible, and humane. To this end, a little over a year ago we started a community advisory board. The board consists of leaders from the community including, The Bail Project, many local churches, the YMCA, Empowering Community Justice Initiative, Caracole, Back to Back Ministries, and the Hamilton County Clerk’s Office.
We’ve also worked to ensure that our services do not end with a verdict, and in 2013 we created our Fresh Start expungement clinic to help people get their criminal records sealed. Since its inception, we’ve sealed over 25,173 charges. In April, the number of offenses eligible for expungement significantly increases and we intend to proactively inform the community that their charges may be eligible.
Why is sealing so valuable? Time and again, people say, "I just want to get my record sealed so that I can get a job!" Getting a job is a great way to restore one’s dignity and to help people stay out of jail.
We'll continue to provide the kind of representation you would want for someone in your own family. We'll do our best to support the efforts of our attorneys, staff, and community partners.
Raymond T. Faller has been the chief public defender for Hamilton County since August 2012.
