Dallas PD caseloads deemed too high
From Pegasus News (via Grits):
John Wiley Price and the Dallas County Commissioners Court don’t appear fazed by the news, but the Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense issued a report yesterday (pdf) analyzing the Dallas public defender office appellate division and caseloads at the state’s largest PD office.Sphere: Related ContentCountering Price’s critique, the TFID found the appellate division cost the county $72 per hour of billable work compared to the $100 paid to private attorneys. Local officials countered that they don’t pay private attorneys for holidays and said PDs bill more hours per case than private lawyers. Quien sabe?
According to the TFID, the Dallas appellate division handles 60 cases per year per attorney, while the Bexar County appellate division handles 35 per attorney. The number of cases assigned to the Dallas appellate division has been increasing every year, said the report.
TFID also countered recent criticisms of the office by the Dallas County Commissioners Court - in particular Commissioner John Wiley Price - that PD office attorneys are lazy and their caseloads are too low.
2 comments
I hope the commissioners take this report more to heart than they did the 2004 report on the Dallas PDs office done by the Spangenburg Group. That report made a number of recommendations that got little more attention than a “thanks for playing.”
Looks like those appellate lawyers in the Dallas PD’s office get to keep their jobs a bit longer. Unfortunately, it also looks like the new case assignment quotas are going to be around for awhile as well.
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