Citing landmark 'Gault' case, DOJ files framework for deciding if juveniles have adequate counsel
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The U.S. Department of Justice has weighed in on behalf of a civil rights group in an ongoing Georgia case over a claimed lack of representation for juvenile defendants in the four-county Cordele Judicial Circuit.
Filed in January 2014 by the Southern Center for Human Rights, the Superior Court of Fulton County case alleges that children frequently appeared in court without a lawyer because the public defender’s office lacked the staff needed to provide representation in all juvenile hearings, reports the Associated Press. This practice violated a state law requiring legal representation of juveniles facing “a disposition of confinement, commitment, or probation,” the suit says.
In a statement of interest filed Friday in N.P. et al. v. The State of Georgia et al. , the DOJ questioned whether children are being adequately represented, even though the circuit retained a contract lawyer to represent juveniles after the civil rights group filed suit, according to the AP article. What is critical is whether enough time is spent on the child’s case and if defense counsel has adequate resources and training, the DOJ wrote; simply assigning a lawyer to the case otherwise can result in “de facto nonrepresentation.”
However, the DOJ is not offering an opinion on the merits of the case, its filing says, but simply providing a “framework” for evaluating the plaintiff’s claims and “determining the types of safeguards that must be in place to ensure that children receive the due process the Constitution demands.”
A DOJ press release says the Friday filing is the first time the department has made such an appearance in a state-court action concerning the right to counsel for juveniles promised by the U.S. Supreme Court in In re Gault. Cornell University Law School’s Legal Information Institute provides a copy of the landmark 14th Amendment due-process case, which was decided in 1967. It is summarized on a United States Courts page.
The AP article doesn’t include any response to the DOJ filing from Cordele Judicial Circuit officials.
Related coverage:
National Public Radio: “Gault Case Changed Juvenile Law”
The Guardian: “Lack of lawyers leaves Georgia teens fearing lifelong harm from minor cases “
