New Orleans Judge Arthur Hunter has called for the release of 7 defendants after they had not been providing adequate public defense counsel in an acceptable amount of time. Each of the defendants are indigent, unable to afford a private criminal defense attorney, and have spent months incarcerated without even having a public defense attorney assigned to their case. Judge Hunter has cited Sixth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights, stating that Louisiana had violated the Constitution in not providing effective counsel. The District Attorney’s office immediately appealed the decision, pushing it to higher courts.
New Orleans Criminal Defense Attorney Gregory Carter has accepted to represent one of the 7 defendants pro bono – his client has been incarcerated for three years without trial. He said of Judge Hunter’s decision that it was clearly difficult to make but was also right. Attorney Carter went on to point out that the Judge and the defendants are not moving to have the cases thrown out entirely; instead, they merely want the men released from jail while they await their trial.
For more information about this ongoing story, click here: http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2016/04/orleans_judge_rules_for_indige.html#incart_m-rpt-2
Additional articles can be seen by clicking here and here.