El Paso County ranks 3rd in state for indigent defense payouts

El Paso County pays private defense attorneys among the highest figures per indigent case in the state, according to the Texas Indigent Defense Commission.

The Council of Judges this week sent a letter to county commissioners this week justifying a recent $15 hourly hike in attorney’s fees.

“We’re just trying to counter the accusation that we’re running amok with the county’s budget — we’re not,” said Judge Patrick Garcia, head of the Council of Judges. “We’ve taken a very cautious and deliberate approach to the increase in attorney’s fees. And this is something we’ve been telling commissioners for a long time that they need to address.”

The county paid private attorneys $773.44 per case to defend the poor last year. That’s in the top three in the state — higher than Tarrant, Dallas, Harris, Travis and Bexar counties — before the fee hike takes effect.

“This has to do with indigent defense and representing people who are unable to hire their own lawyer,” Garcia said. “And our most important perspective: Everybody, regardless of their economic background, deserves to be represented by qualified individuals, given the facts of the case and the law that is involved in their case. That’s what it’s all about.”

Garcia said this week in a letter to County Judge Veronica Escobar that commissioners recently “misled and misinformed” the public about the fee increase. He also said the reason that the top 10 percent of attorneys receive more than 50 percent of indigent fees in El Paso County is because cases like capital murder trials require more time and rack up more fees.

But according to the Texas Indigent Defense Commission, in fiscal 2013, capital murders accounted for less than one percent of all felonies in El Paso County

For example, Garcia presided over 517 adult felony cases in the 384th District Court last year. Of those, only five were capital murder defendants represented by private attorneys.

His court paid fees to all felony defenders totaling roughly $310,000 — about $36,000 of that went to capital murder defenders. Granted, that puts capital murder defense fees at roughly $7,200 per a case — more than nine times the $773.44 cost per felony defense in the county.

“Ultimately these are property taxpayer dollars that are being disbursed and allocated,” said County Commissioner Vince Perez. “They need to be allocated fairly to ensure that there is a transparent and fair process, where every attorney has a fair shot. Every qualified attorney gets a fair shot. Because ultimately it’s not only a matter of fairness and transparency, but it also goes to the quality of representation.”

The state plans to perform an assessment of the county’s indigent defense practices in the next few months. Perez said the $15 fee hike will cost the county an extra roughly $500,000 by the end of this fiscal year, and at least $1 million every year after that.

“I don’t believe there’s a willingness on the court to raise taxes to pay for the attorney’s fees increase,” Perez said. “So if we don’t look at revenue, then we’re going to have to consider cuts, and I think those are the difficult decisions that the court is going to wrestle with for the next several months. The judge, with the authorization of the court, has said that all options are on the table.”