Every day, as he ambles through the cobwebbed halls of the New Orleans criminal court building, public defender Richard Teissier feels he violates his clients’ constitutional rights. The Sixth Amendment established, and the landmark Gideon Supreme Court case affirmed, the right of poor people to legal counsel. At any given moment, when Teissier is representing some 90 accused murderers, rapists and robbers, his office has no money to hire experts or track down witnesses; its law library consists of a set of lawbooks spirited away from a dead judge’s chambers. With so many clients and so few resources, Teissier decided he could not possibly do justice to them all. So he filed suit against himself. He demanded that the court judge his work inadequate, and find more money for more lawyers. A judge agreed and declared the state’s indigent-defense system unconstitutional. The ruling is now on appeal before the Louisiana Supreme Court. “This is a test of whether there is justice in the United States,” Teissier says. “If you’re only going to pay it lip service then get rid of Gideon.” Thirty years ago last week, the Supreme Court unanimously voted in favor of Clarence Earl Gideon, an uneducated gambler and petty thief who insisted on his right to legal counsel. “Any person haled into court who is too poor to hire a lawyer cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided for him,” wrote Justice Hugo Black. “This seems to us to be an obvious truth.” Over the next two decades the court expanded the protection to apply to all criminal cases and stressed that the representation must be “effective.” But today, as defenders of indigents handle a flood of cases with meager resources, the debate rages on whether the promise of Gideon has been fulfilled. Most public defenders think not. In Memphis, lawyers lament the plead-’em- and-speed-’em-through pace. “It reminds me of the old country song we have here in Tennessee: ‘We’re not making love, we’re just keeping score,’ ” says chief public defender AC Wharton. Across the country, lawyers watch with frustration as the bulk of criminal-justice funds goes to police protection, prisons and prosecutors, leaving just 2.3% for public defense services. “We aren’t being given the same weapons,” says Mary Broderick of the National Legal Aid and Defender Association. “It’s like trying to deal with smart bombs when all you’ve got is a couple of cap pistols.” During the war on crime of the ’70s and the war on drugs of the ’80s, funneling money to defend suspects was a low priority. Meanwhile, the ranks of police and prosecutors were beefed up, leading to more arrests, more trials and more work for public defenders. “Indigent defense is a cause without a constituency,” says Stephen Bright, director of the Southern Center for Human Rights. Over the years, states have unenthusiastically devised three strategies to handle indigent cases: public defender offices, court-appointed lawyers and contract systems. In all cases, the emphasis is on holding costs down. Justice — and sometimes people’s lives — can get lost in the mix. PUBLIC DEFENDERS: NO RESPECT
