Unlike other public defenders’ offices across the state, the Barren County branch has not reduced its caseload in response to budget cuts and a growing client base.
“We are not at that point yet,” said Greg Berry, with the area Department of Public Advocacy.
Berry added that standards set for rural communities such as Glasgow and Barren County included not taking on more than 400 new cases per attorney per year.
Right now, Berry said, attorneys are averaging about 330 new cases per year.
Reducing caseloads, however, is something other public defenders in Kentucky are looking to accomplish.
On June 30, the DPA and Louisville and Jefferson County Public Defender Corporation filed a lawsuit seeking permission to decline additional indigent clients when representing them would create excessive caseloads.
DPA director Ernie Lewis said the General Assembly failed to provide sufficient funding this year to pay for public defenders. He said the jobs of up to 60 trial attorneys will be cut as a result.
Elizabethtown’s DPA office may see future vacancies go unfilled because of reduced funding. The attorneys will also no longer defend clients charged with contempt in child support cases or those arrested on mental inquest warrants.
The lawsuit also calls for judges to appoint alternative attorneys who would be paid by the state when caseloads force public defenders to turn clients away.
Berry said the state DPA standards require them to no longer provide conflict attorneys for cases.
These individuals come from the private bar association in cases where two or more defendants are charged in reference to the same crime. A conflict could arise if one of the defendants points the finger at the other one, according to Berry.
State DPA offices handle between 3,000 to 5,000 conflict cases a year at a cost of more than $1 million, Berry said.
“With the budget cuts that are happening this new fiscal year, DPA can no longer afford to pay that,” he said.
The Associated Press and The News-Enterprise contributed to this report.
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