Friday, Aug. 31, 2001 | 8:32 a.m.
The five attorneys applying for the county's top public defender's job disagree on whether the office takes enough cases to trial.
A federally funded study this year said the office's average is well below the national.
The attorneys' stances give some insight into how they would run the office, and are likely be taken into consideration when Clark County Commissioners decide who should replace Morgan Harris, who will retire in October after 29 years as public defender.
The Spangenberg report, which was released in January, revealed that public defenders take only 0.6 percent of their cases to trial and plea bargain the rest. The national trial average is between 4 percent and 7 percent.
The Spangenberg Group is a research and consulting firm from Massachusetts that was hired by the American Bar Association two years ago to study indigent defense throughout the U.S.
Using a $105,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, the group studied how five states represented poor defendants. Nevada was one of the five.
Thomas Pitaro and deputy public defender Peter Christiansen believe the report was too critical of the office.
The attorneys pointed out that while defense attorneys make recommendations, the defendant decides whether or not to take a deal.
Cases are traditionally plea bargained when prosecutors don't believe they can prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt and defense attorneys fear a conviction.
"Attorneys are required to look at each case individually without concern for statistics," said Pitaro, a local defense attorney who was involved in the Margaret Rudin murder trial.
"You can't evaluate an office based upon the trial rate," Pitaro said. "You also can't evaluate judges, public defenders and prosecutors on the number of days they spend in trial."
The public defenders he knows put in more than 40 hours a week, Pitaro said.
"By and large they are dedicated public servants," Pitaro said.
Christiansen, who has been in the public defender's office 26 years, said that while he believes the office could try a few more cases annually, people have lost sight of the fact that more than 90 percent of the people who go to trial are convicted.
Their clients are often better off taking deals, Christiansen said. The fact that not going to trial saves time and money is secondary.
According to court statistics, 8,266 criminal cases were filed last year and 5,330 of them were assigned to public defenders. If the office had tried 4 percent of those and all other defense attorneys took their cases to trial, there would have been 300 criminal trials last year.
The county's 19 District judges can only try 300 cases a year among them, both civil and criminal.
"There are only so many courtrooms available for so many days, plus you've got those high-profile cases that tie judges up for two or three months," said William "Lew" Wolfbrandt, a defense attorney who represented Terrell Young last year in the 1999 slayings of four young men. "The number of cases don't leave much room, but I think there is some room for more to be tried."
Deputy Public Defender Marcus Cooper, who has been with the public defender's office nearly 24 years, agreed. He said he believes the office has gotten into a "negotiating mode," but stressed that can be changed.
Cooper said he would ensure that cases are still evaluated based on the client's best interests.
Federal public defender Franny Forsman said the office's trial rate is something she would like to look at if she were selected. Rumors that she would force her attorneys to go to trial are untrue, however, she said.
"I am a tough litigant and I believe indigent defendants deserve tough litigation, the same as anyone else, but it all depends upon what is best for the client," Forsman said.
For example, if an attorney believes a client should accept a deal before a preliminary hearing, so be it, Forsman said.
Every case needs to be judged on its own merits, just as every lawyer needs to be evaluated, Forsman said. There are a number of issues that must be weighed before deciding if a case should be negotiated.
Trial experience is one of those factors, Forsman said.
"A lawyer who hasn't gone to trial in 10 years is a problem," Forsman said.
Forsman said most of the attorneys she knows "have a lot of heart and a real desire to do well by a client."
"I'd like to be able to take that desire and that heart and develop it," Forsman said.
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