Public Defenseless Explores Appellate Advocacy

  This week on the Public Defenseless Podcast, I decided to take a bit of a dive away from state level/line defenders and turn to a woman with decades of experience in Appellate Public Defense work. Frances Smiley-Brown previously served […]

Public Defenseless: A Podcast with Aisha McWeay

  Today on Public Defenseless, I had an amazing opportunity to speak with Aisha McWeay, Executive Director of Still She Rises. With the large majority of people going through the criminal processing system being young men, we often forget the […]

Public Defenseless: Podcast with Keisha Hudson

"Today on the Public Defenseless Podcast I spoke with Keisha Hudson, Chief Defender of the Philadelphia Defender Association. Take a listen to this conversation to learn about the ins and outs of Pennsylvania Public Defense and what makes Philadelphia standout […]

Public Defenseless covers… trust.

  On this episode of Public Defenseless, host Hunter Parnell covers the difficulty of building trust back in communities with a negative view of public defenders. In the short time that I have hosted this podcast, I've noticed a consistent […]

Today on Public Defenseless, a chat with Stephen Hanlon…

  Join me today as I sit down with Stephen Hanlon, an expert in the way data can be used to benefit public defense.  After decades of work in public interest law, Lawyer Hanlon had his eyes opened to the […]

Why We Celebrate Gideon Day

You should know the story of Clarence Earl Gideon.   Gideon’s Story In 1961, someone stole jukebox money from a Florida pool hall. The lone eyewitness identified Clarence Earl Gideon, who was arrested and charged with a felony. Uneducated in […]

Concerts for Indigent Defense livestream, March 18 at 7pm EDT

Concerts for Indigent Defense the phenomenon of musicians and their communities standing together in support of the constitutional right of every person accused of a crime in America to be represented by a lawyer.   Concerts for Indigent Defense are […]

A Deeper Look at Our State’s ‘Legal Deserts’

This article is reprinted from the September 2021 issue of Washington State Bar News with the permission of the Washington State Bar Association.  My dad is an optometrist in Raymond (population 2,963). He’s the only one in Raymond. In fact, he’s the only one […]

Public Defender Independence

This article is originally published in the Texas Journal on Civil Liberties & Civil Rights, Fall 2021 issue. (27 Tex. J. on C.L. & C.R. 25) Article abstract: Independence is an aspiration for public defenders. It is the ability to […]

New Mexico attorney workload study shows alarming understaffing

We knew a deep analysis of our staffing and workload would show a deficiency, we just didn’t know it would be this much!    “The New Mexico Project” workload analysis report from the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Legal […]