The Atlantic
Defend the Public Defenders
Their ability to hold on to their job should not depend on the same people they challenge in court.
March 13, 2021
Getty / The Atlantic
Public defense might be one of the rare professions in which doing one’s job too well can lead to being fired. The reasons for this are structural public defenders are tasked with an obligation they cannot fulfill without upsetting those tasked with helping them fulfill it and the system can be fixed structurally: by creating a state-level office whose job it is to defend public defenders.
Consider the case of two public defenders from Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Dean Beer and Keisha Hudson, who say they were fired last year after filing an amicus brief describing as unacceptable and unconstitutional court decisions regarding bail that harmed their clients. (The county board responsible for their firing has not publicly commented on the personnel matter and did not respond to a request for comment
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