Contra Costa's campaign to contain gang violence has turned up an unanticipated cost by greatly multiplying the number of private attorneys paid with taxpayer dollars to defend people held on murder charges.
In the most prominent example this year, eight of nine gang members accused of killing five people in West Contra Costa must be represented by private attorneys, stretching a depleted special fund the county expects to be $1.3 million in the red at the end of the fiscal year.
The district attorney and law enforcement's increased focus on dangerous gangs generated complicated and expensive multiple-defendant homicide cases, sending private criminal attorney costs to unprecedented levels at a time when the county coffers are emptying.
"We've had a much higher number of multiple-defendant cases and under law they are entitled to separate representation," said Julie Enea, senior deputy county administrator.
The West County gang case is an example of how the cost of defending indigent defendants — mandated by the state — can quickly soar.
Each of the nine defendants, charged in overlapping crimes, has the constitutional right to his own attorney. The entire public defender's office is considered one attorney, so it can only represent one defendant. The county's alternate defender office often can handle a second defendant, but it has not been assigned a client in the West County gang case, leaving eight defendants Advertisementwith eight private attorneys culled from a Contra Costa County Bar Association pool.
"When things like that happen (with gang violence) we have to do our part to stem that tide. If that affects the conflicts panel, there's not much we can do about that," District Attorney Robert Kochly said. "You don't target something if it doesn't exist. There's been a concerted effort to try and eliminate it. In the last few years there's been more resources focused on that particular problem."
Private attorneys also take defendants when the public defender's office has ethical conflicts with defendants or witnesses.
"We can get any criminal case ranging from misdemeanor shoplifting to death penalty murder cases," said David Briggs, Contra Costa County Bar Association administrator. Murder, and especially capital murder, cases are the real budget busters.
As of Wednesday, the conflict panel had handled 56 homicide and 11 capital homicide cases this fiscal year, resulting in an anticipated year-end $4 million cost. In 2002-03, the panel handled 21 homicides and one capital homicide case for $1.5 million.
Because of the steep increase in costs, Contra Costa has started asking for more case information from the panel, Enea said. The county audited the fund and found nothing significant, she said.
"We work at significantly reduced rates than what we would charge private clients, less than 50 percent," Briggs said. Despite the discount rate, there is no shortage of takers.
"People like them. Working homicides are interesting cases," Briggs said. "Plus, it's guaranteed money."
The panel consists of private attorneys who meet specified qualifications. They are assigned cases on rotation subdivided by geography, so that West County attorneys see more activity with the increased homicides in that area, Briggs said.
In addition to hourly rates, the county reimburses all ancillary costs, such as private detectives, professional witnesses or interpreters.
Judges control the death penalty case costs, Kochly said, and often judges are loose in allowing defense attorneys to rack up significant bills. For instance, Kochly said prosecutors typically do not decide whether to seek the death penalty until after the preliminary hearing, but defense attorneys often treat and charge the case as a capital homicide in anticipation.
The District Attorney's Office also finds itself in a budget mess. The department must cut $4.1 million from its books, meaning 33 less prosecutors and no misdemeanor drunken driving and drug possession cases.
Neighboring counties are not seeing the same trend. Solano County estimates it will hit its $2.6 million budgeted amount this year.
Alameda County public defender Diane Bellas said her office has not seen more than usual multiple-defendant homicide cases. The county is on target to hit this year's $5.26 million budget for court-appointed attorneys, according to the county administrator's office.
Meanwhile, the West Contra Costa gang case remains in pretrial hearings. It took months for all nine defendants to enter their pleas because of the thousands of pages of police reports and grand jury transcripts that had to be doled out to the contingent of defense attorneys, said Aron DeFerrari, the deputy district attorney working the case.
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