Audit Backs 2nd Public Defender’s Office : Courts: The county could save $750,000 a year by replacing a group of private attorneys in cases involving indigents, report says.

Ventura County could save up to 60% of the $1.3 million a year it pays a group of private lawyers to represent indigent defendants by creating a new public agency to oversee the cases, auditors have found.

A draft report by the county auditor-controller’s office concludes that alternatives to the present system “could result in savings up to $750,000” a year.

The report, which has been forwarded to selected county administrators for response, says that the private Conflict Defense Associates--to which about 2,200 court cases a year are referred--spends $623 per case compared to $187 by the county public defender’s office.

“Studies by other counties indicate that substantial cost savings may be realized through use of alternatives to contracting for indigent defense,” the audit says.

Indigent defendants are referred to Conflict Defense Associates when the public defender is representing a client in the same case, and therefore has a conflict of interest.

County administrators said that the auditor’s figures are misleading because the CDA handles a much higher percentage of time-consuming, high-cost felonies than does the public defender’s office.

“They have a very cursory number,” said Kathy McCann, an analyst for Chief Administrative Officer Richard Wittenberg. “They’re dividing costs by the number of cases, and that does not get you there at all.” Sheila Gonzalez, executive officer of the county courts, said that CDA’s costs are high “and understandably so . . . Several of their cases are money-grabbers. They suck up a lot of money.”

James Farley, one of CDA’s four principal attorneys, said the auditor’s figures do not reflect that private lawyers have to pay for overhead not charged to the public defender’s budget--office space, telephones, data processing and utilities. Nor do public lawyers need malpractice insurance, he said.

Farley said, however, that if a second public defender’s office would save the county money, it ought to start one.

“Do it, for crying out loud,” he said. “We’re not getting fat and rich and living high on the hog on this contract. We’re putting back one hell of a lot of work.”

The preliminary audit, covering three years ending in June, 1991, found that Conflict Defense Associates generally met the conditions of its contract. But the audit also reports that:

* There has been no open bidding for the indigent-services contract since CDA got the job 10 years ago, and the lack of competition “can expose the county to public criticism.”

* The four principal attorneys for CDA received $432,000 in the last fiscal year, but dedicated just 65% of their time to the public cases. Farley said, however, that the four attorneys averaged about 90% of their time on public cases.

* The CDA spent $19,800 on items such as chairs, copy-machine servicing, books and malpractice insurance that are not allowed by contract. Farley said the items had been allowed but were deleted from the current contract. The audit found $1,700 in illegible handwritten invoices and $3,500 in unsupported consultation fees.

The audit also said that county management of the contract, which is overseen by the chief administrative office, has been lax. Auditors noted that the county had set no minimum experience standard for attorneys who receive subcontracts from the CDA.

James Tamekazu, chief of the county’s audit division, declined to discuss the specifics of the audit because it is still confidential. He said the numbers in the report “are preliminary and subject to change.”

“Whether it’s $750,000 or $400,000 or $200,000, if the potential for savings is there, we should look into it,” Tamekazu said. “All we’re trying to say is that maybe there are better alternatives than the CDA process.” Tamekazu said that before a final CDA audit is released next month, his auditors will try to refine their figures so that the costs of CDA and public defender cases can be compared by type--felonies compared to felonies, for example.

McCann and Vince Ordonez, assistant courts administrator, said such detailed comparisons do not exist today. But a federally funded study made such a comparison in 1986.

The study, by the Jefferson Institute for Justice Studies, found that regardless of the type of case, public defender costs were only one-fourth as much as the CDA’s.

Many California counties, trying to stretch tight budgets, are studying alternatives to assigning indigent cases to private attorneys. Orange County is considering a second public defender’s office after a study this year found that public defender cases cost just one-fourth as much as those of private attorneys.

San Diego County started its alternate public defender’s office last year because indigent cases were so costly, said Sunny Romero, a manager in the office. Romero said the county’s cost per case for the second public office is just a third of that in cases still assigned to a panel of private attorneys--$552 to $1,755.

In most categories of felony cases, private attorneys cost at least twice as much as public lawyers, he said.

Even after both San Diego County public defender’s offices are fully staffed, that county will still need a pool of private lawyers--such as Ventura County’s CDA--to take cases that have more than two indigent defendants, Romero said.

But assignments to private attorneys already have been reduced from 9% of all indigent cases to 4% and are expected to soon drop to 2.8%, he said.

If such a percentage held true in Ventura County, a second public defender’s office would reduce the CDA’s 9% share of indigent cases by about two-thirds. And hundreds of thousands of dollars could be saved, if San Diego County’s cost estimates hold true here and its results could be duplicated.

Ventura County analyst McCann said she is aware of San Diego County’s apparent success and will evaluate all options to Conflict Defense Associates before its four-year contract expires in June, 1993.

“We will be looking at alternatives,” she said. “But some counties have tried that and gotten rid of it.”

Kenneth Clayman, the Ventura County public defender, said a second public defender has been tried only in San Diego and Solano counties. The Solano County office was a failure primarily because of the jealousies that developed between the two public offices, he said.

“I’m very proud of the public defender model,” Clayman said. “It’s efficient, and it saves money.”

But McCann said that the CDA already is a good option compared to appointing private attorneys for individual cases, as was the practice locally before 1981.

“This is much more cost-effective than what we did before,” she said. “They’ve done a good job for the county. There have not been any major problems at all . . . And they are well liked by the judges.”

McCann said that she does not believe that the extraordinary savings projected by the auditor would materialize if the county switched to a second public defender’s office. The auditor’s cost-per-case figures are flawed, because the CDA handles a much greater percentage of serious and costly cases, she said.

Statistics from the CDA contract and the public defender tend to support that contention. About 31% of CDA’s 2,200 new cases a year are felonies, compared to 9% of the public defender’s 22,800 cases.

But Clayman, citing the 1986 Jefferson Institute study, said there is indisputably a lower cost per case in his office than with the CDA.

Part of the reason is that low salaries are paid to most of the 39 lawyers in his office, Clayman said. Pay for his lawyers begins at $31,000 a year and escalates to a maximum of $71,000 for a few senior trial attorneys, he said. Clayman makes $99,000 a year plus benefits and a chief deputy makes $83,000.

By comparison, Conflict Defense Associates’ four principal attorneys will each receive a flat fee of $112,000 from the county this fiscal year, with no benefits or stipend for office staff. They serve as trial lawyers in major cases as well as managing the caseload.

But the four--Farley, Charles Cassy, Willard Wiksell and Joel Steinfeld--are free to take non-indigent cases as well. The county audit report said the lawyers spend 65% of their time on county referrals, a figure Farley disputes.

“Mr. Wiksell or I handle almost every capital case that comes through,” said Farley, who said he spends 80% of his time on county business. “I’ve been in trial since last summer, and my private practice falls apart.”

The other three principals spend even more time on the CDA contract, Farley said.

“We’re not making a ton of money on this contract,” Farley said. He said that if CDA lost its contract to a second public defender’s office there would still be plenty of work for him in indigent law because of the cases neither public office could accept.

“It would be a lot easier for me and I would probably make close to the same amount of money,” Farley said.

In addition to the four principal attorneys, the CDA hires about a dozen associate lawyers, six of whom earn $1,000 per felony case and are guaranteed five cases a month, Steinfeld said. Another six handle misdemeanors and get $275 a case, with no guaranteed number of cases, he said.