The creation of a public defender’s office in Alamance County solves the last problems at issue in a federal lawsuit over policies in Alamance County courts on people who are newly arrested and requirements for posting bond to get out of jail, according to a recent court filing.
According to a joint status report filed with U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina all parties have agreed to file for the lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union and others to be dismissed. However, the plaintiffs will ask for the court to order the defendants to pay attorney fees and court costs.
New Public Defender Ricky Champion, who was sworn in Dec. 1 and now has a staff of six assistant public defenders, provided a sworn affidavit attesting to his office’s work and policies representing newly arrested indigent defendants and others.
“Given these representations, as well as the Court’s observation that creation of the public defender’s office ‘would seem to grant Plaintiffs nearly all — if not literally all — of the practical relief they have sought,’ all parties will stipulate that Plaintiffs’ only remaining claims — whether the Sixth Amendment requires representation by counsel at initial appearances and first appearances — are moot and, like their other claims, should be dismissed,” the joint status report said.
The lawsuit initially was filed in late 2019.
In July 2020 the Alamance courts adopted a new set of bond guidelines taking each defendant’s ability to pay into account as part of a court-approved agreement with the ACLU and to reduce the jail population during to the COVID-19 pandemic.
That resolved much of what was at issue in the lawsuit, leaving only the issue of whether people have a constitutional right to a lawyer even at their first hearing after being arrested.
Requiring people to pay money to get out of jail has been a contentious issue across the country in recent years. Critics say the requirement imprisons low-income people before they are convicted. While in jail, people can lose jobs, apartments and custody of their children and cannot effectively participate in their own defense since they have to rely on courts or others outside to find and communicate with lawyers.
The 2019 lawsuit, one of a number filed in several states, was filed in Alamance County because it had the second-highest percentage in the state of misdemeanor defendants held in jail and unable to post bond in 2018 and 2018.
