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| Fla. Gov.: Close Death Row Lawyer Offices |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 02/03/2003 |
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Gov. Jeb Bush has proposed that Florida close the three offices of state lawyers who represent death row inmates and instead hire private attorneys. The governor says the move should save the state about $4 million. But critics say the change could slow down the appeal process and end up making costs as high as they are now, if not higher. Filing appeals in capital cases 'is difficult, complex and time-consuming,' Larry Spalding, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, wrote in a memo he drafted January 23. 'Few attorneys want to take on this type of criminal practice. Fewer still have the ability to do so.' Spalding was the first director of the state office of death row lawyers. It was created by the Legislature in 1985 after courts blocked some executions because inmates didn't have attorneys for appeals. Before 1985, the state relied on a network of volunteer attorneys to represent death row inmates. Six years ago, the Legislature split the state office up into three regional independent offices. A year later, it added a law to pay private attorneys who have signed up with a state registry to handle overflow cases. There's not much difference in the performance of the state lawyers and the private attorneys, according to Roger Maas, executive director of the Commission on Capital Cases, a six-member board charged with overseeing capital appeals for the state. Currently the three state offices have a combined staff of 50 attorneys and 48 support staff and a combined budget of $9 million. They represent 218 death row inmates. The registry lists 133 private lawyers, and about 60 of them have been appointed, Maas said. Together they represent 72 death row inmates. The budget for the registry attorneys is about $1.5 million. In Bush's $54 billion budget proposal, he recommends spending $5.8 million on private lawyers next year. His top budget aide, Donna Arduin, told the House Appropriations Committee recently that the savings 'result from only paying attorneys when they're working on cases.' Supporters of the state death row offices, like Spalding and Stephen Bright, executive director of an Atlanta center that represents death row inmates, say by doing nothing but death appeals the state lawyers build up the expertise needed to represent death row inmates properly and efficiently. Maas said private lawyers with several years experience have the skills to handle a capital case even if they have never done so before. |
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