Pay now or pay more later: ACLU warns underfunding plagues Idaho’s public defense | Opinion
A recent motion by the American Civil Liberties Union makes clear that Idaho’s new statewide public defense system is in crisis, as Sarah Cutler recently reported, and lawmakers should move as quickly as possible to resolve it.
The state recently took over public defense, a task that county government had previously shouldered. That came after a series of reports in the mid-2010s made it clear that Idaho’s public defense system was inadequate and dysfunctional.
The state did need to take over the public defense system, something lawmakers resisted doing for years despite counties begging for help. Defendants in small counties were not being served as well as defendants in counties like Ada, Canyon, Kootenai and Bonneville. The quality of public defense should not depend on how wealthy or urban the surrounding community is.
And there was the real risk of an acute crisis. Can you imagine what would happen in Clark County, which has about half the population of New Plymouth, if there were a death penalty case requiring two death-penalty-certified attorneys to be retained for months or years? The recent trial of Lori Vallow cost neighboring Madison and Fremont Counties about $2 million, as the Post Register reported. That’s nearly a quarter of Clark County’s total budget — for everything, not just public defenders. Who knows what would have happened if Chadd Daybell lived a bit farther north?
Unfortunately, it seems the state of Idaho shot itself in the foot in the quest for fiscal conservatism. The state originally appropriated a bit over $50 million to fund the office. Gov. Brad Little’s budget request would increase that to $89 million — an exceptionally rare 70% increase, and an acknowledgment of how deep the current crisis is.
One of the biggest problems is that, with funds so limited, the state public defense system had to institute massive pay cuts for public defenders in the state’s largest counties. That’s an insult to public defenders around the state, who do one of the most important jobs there is: providing a rigorous defense for people without the means to pay for one.
Sometimes, a public defender is the only thing standing between an innocent person and a long prison term. John Thomas, a public defender in Bonneville County, led legal efforts that resulted in the release of Chris Tapp, who spent two decades in prison after being wrongfully convicted of murder. That’s the kind of noble work that deserves just compensation.
But a whole lot of people represented by public defenders are guilty, some lawmakers are sure to object. Why waste a bunch of money on them?
First, until you have a trial, you never know which is which. Fail to provide a rigorous defense for the guilty and you’ll fail to provide it for the innocent, as well.
Second, if you want to spend as little money as possible on the guilty, the way to do that is also to provide them with the best possible defense.
Spend a little time looking at appeals and petitions for post-conviction relief, and you’ll see one claim made in almost every case: ineffective assistance of counsel. And if a defendant can prove their lawyer wasn’t doing a good job — if, for example, their lawyer had no way to mail legal documents, as one public defender reported in an affidavit attached to the ACLU’s motion — then the whole trial may have to be repeated, with taxpayer footing the bill for both the prosecution and defense.
And that’s just the start. The ACLU also reports:
- Lack of access to internet service and computers
- Lack of access to legal records
- Inadequate funding for access to court transcripts
- Defendants going without any assigned counsel, for months in some cases
- Unmanageable caseloads
- Judges outright dismissing cases against some defendants because no counsel can be found.
So this single year of a public defense system in disrepair could cost taxpayers for years — to say nothing of the fact that the state has engaged in widespread violations of many citizens’ basic constitutional rights.
In the long run, the best way to minimize the taxes spent on guilty people and to ensure that rights are protected, is to provide every defendant a rock-solid defense. That makes it less likely innocent people will wind up in prison and less likely we’ll have to foot the bill for repeat trials for the guilty.
Lawmakers should move quickly to pass emergency funding for state public defenders and dramatically increase the public defense budget for next year. Every day they wait is a day Idahoans’ rights continue to be violated, in ways taxpayers will eventually foot the bill for.
This story was originally published January 13, 2025 at 4:00 AM with the headline "Pay now or pay more later: ACLU warns underfunding plagues Idaho’s public defense | Opinion."