Law Offices of the Mohave County
Public Defender

FY 2007
Annual Report

Prepared by:
Dana P. Hlavac
Public Defender
316 N. 5th St.
Kingman, AZ 86401

Executive Summary
This report is prepared in accordance with A.R.S. §11-584(A)(2) & (3) which requires that the
Public Defender prepare and file with the Board of Supervisors an annual report of services rendered
as well as an annual report with the Presiding Judge of the Superior Court, the Chief Probation
Officer and the Board of Supervisors on the average cost of defending a felony case. This report
combines the requirements of A.R.S. §11-584(A)(2) & (3) by setting forth the number of cases filed
and to which an indigent defense attorney was appointed during FY 2007 together with an
accounting of funds expended in FY 2007. The report will also highlight several of our
accomplishments during the year. Finally, the report provides an analysis of the statistics for future
planning purposes.
This report also incorporates data relevant to the Loan Repayment Assistance and Relocation
Assistance Programs that were approved by the Board of Supervisors in January of 2005. This data
will review the number of attorneys on staff at the beginning of the fiscal year that were projected to
be eligible for participation in the Loan Repayment Assistance Program together with data regarding
their individual and collective comparison of employment history in relation to historical trends in
attorney retention.
FY 2007 represented the twenty-second full year of operation for the Law Offices of the Mohave
County Public Defender. The Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender continues to
provide quality legal services to those persons whose cause has been entrusted to this office for
representation.
In addition, the office continues to strive to fulfill our goal of providing indigent defense services in
a cost efficient manner. The staff at the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender
remains dedicated to considering the impact of our organizational structure and efficiency on the
taxpayers of Mohave County.
FY 2007 continued to see significant gains in recruiting with over 130 applicants from around the
nation seeking a position with the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender. From this
group of applicants, 30 individuals traveled to Kingman to be interviewed and 8 final offers were
extended to fill vacancies which existed at the close of FY 2007. At the close of FY 2007, these
eight vacancies reflected forty percent of the authorized positions were unfilled. 7 of the offers were
accepted with individuals starting as early as April of 2007, and as late as September 2007. All
individuals that accepted offers needed to take the July 2007 Bar Examination to obtain their
Arizona license. Due to the time required to recruit and train new attorneys the effectiveness of this
forty percent will be minimal during FY 2008, with the most significant impact to be seen in FY
2009 when these new employees will have a full 6+ months of training and licensure behind them.
As a result, although the positions will have been filled during FY 2007 there will be only minor
increases in efficiency and ability to handle caseloads within the office during FY 2008. This will
result in continued excessive contract expenditures on private counsel throughout most of FY 2008.
For FY 2007, the vacancy rate was equal to the lowest since FY 2004 at 21.5%. Overall

productivity as measured by hours worked was the second highest since FY 2004 at 35,906, or an
average of 43.36 hours per week.
During FY 2007, nine attorneys left the office, with four of those attorneys having less than six
months experience. The remaining five departures averaged thirty months of service. During the
same period nine attorneys began employment.
FY 2007 saw significant relief in facilities capacity and appropriateness. The renovation of the
historic St. John’s United Methodist Church was finished in the spring of 2007, and complete movein was finished in the 3rd quarter. The renovated facility has significantly improved morale,
efficiency and overall professionalism within the office. Long term benefits are expected to be seen
in the form of greater success at recruiting and retention efforts.
FY 2007 began extremely promising as 8 offers were extended to third year graduating law school
students. These offers went to students from Franklin Pearce College of Law, New Hampshire;
University of Seattle, Washington; University of Cincinnati, Ohio (2); University of Louisville,
Kentucky; SUNY Buffalo, New York; Harvard, Massachusetts; and Tulane University, Louisiana.
Unfortunately none of these individuals began work until the fourth quarter of FY 07, with the bulk
of them beginning in the first quarter of FY 2008. This meant that for the bulk of FY 2007,
professional staffing was critically low. Over 800 cases were “overflowed” to private contract
counsel because there was insufficient internal trained professional staff to handle the cases. The
year end per case cost analysis showed that private contract cases continue to be significantly more
expensive than cases handled by an in house indigent defense office. Unanticipated costs were
roughly $ 719,000 for FY 2007 due to staffing shortages. By comparison there were cost avoidances
of roughly $ 575,000 from the same staffing shortages. The net to the county was an unexpected
loss of $145,000 for FY 2007.
On the positive side, since the implementation of the Hot Job incentive program for recruiting and
retention, applications are up significantly and to date retention is up from 25% to 71% although the
time period to fully evaluate retention differences is too short to be reliable at this point.
At the beginning of the fiscal year, one additional FTE was authorized through the budget process to
serve as a Mitigation Specialist. A Mitigation Specialist assists attorneys in issues related to pretrial release and post-conviction sentencing and alternative release and treatment programs.
Mitigation Specialists are well recognized throughout the nation as an integral function of indigent
defense. A key function of the Mitigation Specialist is to interview and screen new admittees in the
Mohave County Jail whenever there are initial indications of special mental health concerns.
Additionally the Mitigation Specialist screens both in-custody and out-of custody Public Defender
clients for treatment programs in lieu of continued incarceration if appropriate and makes alternative
sentencing recommendations in appropriate cases in lieu of prison incarceration.
The Mitigation Specialist also allows licensed attorneys to focus more on the legal aspects of a
clients case, rather than get tied up in the social work aspects of treatment programs. This results in
a greater level of productivity and quality in the services provided by licensed attorney staff
ii

members. Previously attorneys who had clients whom they believed would be better served by
treatment programs, spent an exorbitant amount of time pursuing these options. This occurs because
the attorneys are not as familiar with the availability of such programs, and it therefore took them
much longer to research these issues. The time that an attorney puts into social program research is
better spent on the legal issues. Ultimately, if an attorney's workload becomes excessive, there
would be an additional need for more attorneys. Attorneys are more costly to the County. It is
therefore most beneficial to the county to attempt to divert these social program activities away from
the attorney and to a social "expert" who can perform the tasks with greater efficiency and at lower
cost.
Unfortunately due to processing times and the fact that this position was new to the County and
required a complete classification study, there was a significant delay in hiring to fill this newly
created position and the position was not filled until the second half of FY 07.

iii

Table of Contents
Executive Summary .........................................................................................................................i
Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................4
List of Figures .................................................................................................................................4
List of Tables...................................................................................................................................4
Introduction .....................................................................................................................................6
Part I - Indigent Defense Caseload Statistics ............................................................................7
A.
Service Delivery Methods .............................................................................................7
B.
Case Classifications.......................................................................................................7
1. Felony Cases................................................................................................................9
2. Juvenile Cases ...........................................................................................................11
A. Delinquent and Incorrigible Juveniles...................................................................11
B. Dependencies.........................................................................................................11
3. Misdemeanor Cases.......................................................................................................12
4. Appeals and Post Conviction Relief Cases ...................................................................12
Part II - Indigent Defense Costs ..............................................................................................13
Cost per Case Analysis..........................................................................................................14
Part III - FY 2007 Highlights and Achievements....................................................................16
Part IV – Conclusion (Challenges and Trends for the Future)................................................21
Appendix A - Where the Numbers Come From and What They Represent ...........................24
Appendix B - Breakdown of Most Prevalent Crimes for FY 2007 By Charge.......................25
General Category Breakdown ...............................................................................................25
Appendix C - Detailed Budget Report ....................................................................................27
Appendix D - Cost per Case Analysis using Weighting Factors ............................................28
List of Figures
Figure 1 – This Chart illustrates the average cost per case for all three forms of legal service
providers, as well as the average for all services for fiscal year 2007. .......................29
Figure 2 – This Chart shows an annual comparison for all three indigent defense provider
systems and the average for the county provided service. ..........................................30
Figure 3 – This chart shows the growth in the volume of raw cases handled by the respective
service provider systems within Mohave County. General decreases in the
number of outside contract case assignments is a result of more stringent conflict
review, and greater internal efficiencies and optimization of resources. Recent
increases in the number of outside contract case assignments is a result of
staffing shortages coupled with increased overall case filings. ..................................31
List of Tables
Table 1 – This table shows the raw caseloads assigned to each of the three respective
delivery providers of indigent defense for FY 2007. The 11 cases listed as rejected by
the Legal Defender’s Office were cases which were assigned to the Legal Defender’s
office, accepted by that office, but subsequently rejected due to a conflict arising during
the handling of the case. These cases were only counted once and credited to the Legal
Defender’s office. ................................................................................................................... 8
Table 2 – This table lists the totality of expenditures under the primary General Fund

account which compromises the main budget for the Law Offices of the Mohave
County Public Defender..........................................................................................................13
Table 3 – This table shows the percentage of total indigent defense expenditures for Mohave
County that were attributable to each of the three delivery providers. It is reasonable to
expect 65% of all funding to be through the PDO, 15% to be to contracts and 20% to
LDO in an optimal year. .........................................................................................................14
Table 4 – This table illustrates the average number of hearings attended by a Public
Defender licensed attorney for FY 05-07. The significant increase in the average
number of hearings is a indication of workload issues which are likely to lead to stress,
low morale and ineffective representation if forced to be sustained over long periods of
time. ........................................................................................................................................16
Table 5- This table shows the conversion factors for the cases which were sent to “overflow”
contract counsel during FY 2007. These are cases which could have, and should have
been handled by in-house attorneys on the Public Defender staff, but for lack of
authorizations and staff. The weighted number must be added back into the number of
cases actually handled to make projections on needed staff to fully perform the Public
Defender function at optimal levels (resulting in lower average and overall per case
costs!)......................................................................................................................................18
Table 6 – This table shows the shift in professional staffing levels on an annual basis.................21
Table 7 – This table shows the average length of service by recruiting year, the percentage of
recruit who left county service prior to the end of their initial 2 year period, and the
percentage who still remain on staff. The FY 2006 and FY 2007 numbers could change
if any of the remaining employees leaves prior to the end of their second full year. .............21
Table 8 – This table is solely based on the number of cases in which the listed charge
appears. It is possible for a single case to contain multiple charges, and therefore the
numbers can NOT be used to calculate caseloads. .................................................................25
Table 9 – This table lists charges by major category. The number represents the number of
cases in which one or more of the type of charges appeared. Individual cases often
contain multiple charges and these numbers therefore should NOT be used to attempt to
calculate caseload numbers.....................................................................................................26

Introduction
This report is intended to provide an overview of services provided by the Law Offices of the
Mohave County Public Defender for Fiscal Year 2007.
The first section of this report will discuss indigent defense caseloads and statistics. The caseloads
will be broken down by type of case (i.e.: felony, juvenile, misdemeanor) and by major charge (i.e.:
assault, theft, etc.).
The second section will discuss costs associated with indigent defense and provide a breakdown of
the costs per case on a weighted case basis for FY 2007. The term “weighted case” is used
throughout this report to represent an adjustment to raw caseload figures based on acceptable
workload standards under State (Joe U. Smith) and Federal (US Department of Justice Compendium
of Standards for Indigent Defense Systems) law. Felony cases are weighted as a complete case and
are therefore fully credited (a 1:1 ratio). Misdemeanor cases are weighted as .375 cases (a 3:8
ratio) based on the standard caseload permissible being 400 versus 150 for felonies. Juvenile cases
are weighted as .75 cases (a 3:4 ratio) based on the standard permissible caseload being 200 versus
150 felonies. Probation violation cases are weighted as .375 cases (a 3:8 ratio) based on the
standard caseload permissible being 400 versus 150 for felonies. Appeals are weighted as 6 cases
based on the standard permissible caseload being 25 (a 6:1 ratio) while post-conviction relief
proceedings are weighted as 2 cases based on the standard permissible caseload being 70 (a 2:1
ratio).1 During FY 2007 the necessity of ensuring that caseloads were properly managed and
reviewed was emphasized by the American Bar Association in its’ ethics opinion 06-0441
(Appendix A).
The third section will highlight several of the office highlights and achievements during the year.
The fourth section will detail human resource issues and participation in the Loan Repayment and
Relocation Assistance Programs.
The final section is a conclusion that will discuss challenges and trends that need to be considered
in future planning for success.

1

Please note that prior year caseloads have been adjusted using the proper case weights for appeals and postconviction proceedings.

Part I - Indigent Defense Caseload Statistics
A.

Service Delivery Methods
In Mohave County, there is one method by which indigent persons2 accused of committing
criminal acts are provided legal services. They are appointed a Public Defender and the
case is referred to the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender. As soon as
paperwork is received3 the individuals’ name is screened for potential conflicts in
representing the individual within the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender.
If there is no apparent conflict based on the initial paperwork, a case file is opened and an
attorney is assigned to the case4. If a conflict is identified, the Legal Defender‘s Office is
contacted and a similar conflict check is performed by that office. If there is a conflict in
both the Public and Legal Defender offices, the case is then assigned to a contract counsel
based on a rotating schedule and attorney qualifications.
Data is maintained within the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender on all
cases to which an individual has been assigned government funded counsel. This data is
cross-checked and verified to the greatest extent possible at each year end to ensure the best
information is included within this report.

B.

Case Classifications
There are three major classifications of indigent defense services: (1) felony cases; (2)
juvenile cases (juvenile cases currently include only delinquency cases5); and (3)
misdemeanor cases.6
Prior to reviewing the figures below, please review Appendix A entitled, “Where the
Numbers Came From and What They Represent” for a discussion about how the statistics
are kept, what they mean and how they may differ from the case statistics kept by the other
agencies.

2

It is important to note, that there is a very minimal screening process to determine the true financial eligibility of
individuals based on income and assets.
3
The time frame for paperwork to be transmitted varies from court to court, but can range from 12 to 72 hours.
4
This process usually takes a complete business day.
5
Statutorily the Board of Supervisors may authorize local indigent defense offices to handle “All juvenile proceedings
other than delinquency and incorrigibility proceedings under subdivision (f), including serving as a guardian ad litem,
when appointed by the court pursuant to section 8-221, if the court appoints the public defender and the board of
supervisors has advised the presiding judge of the county that the public defender is authorized to accept the
appointment.” A.R.S. § 11-584(H)
6
Additional representational duties are authorized by statute, but such authorization along with accompanying staffing
has not occurred in Mohave County to date. Specifically, local indigent defense services may represent “All mental
health hearings regarding release recommendations held before the psychiatric security review board pursuant to
section 13-3994, when appointed by the court as provided in section 31-502, subsection A, paragraph 8, if the court
appoints the public defender and the board of supervisors has advised the presiding judge of the superior court in the
county that the public defender is authorized to accept the appointment.” A.R.S. §11-584(i) and may act “As
attorneys pursuant to title 14, chapter 5, article 4 of adults who are allegedly unable to effectively manage their affairs
or preserve their estates, if the court appoints the public defender and the board of supervisors has advised the
presiding judge of the county that the public defender is authorized to accept the appointment.” A.R.S. § 11-584(j).

Caseload Counts FY 2007
PDO
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations
Subtotal
LDO
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations
Rejected
Subtotal
Private Contract
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations
Subtotal
Total

1946
1951
423
57
25
259
4661
418
677
87
0
0
185
11
1367
80
862
108
1
0
173
1224
7252

Table 1 – This table shows the raw caseloads assigned to each of the three respective delivery providers of indigent
defense for FY 2007. The 11 cases listed as rejected by the Legal Defender’s Office were cases which
were assigned to the Legal Defender’s office, accepted by that office, but subsequently rejected due to a
conflict arising during the handling of the case. These cases were only counted once and credited to the
Legal Defender’s office.

1.

Felony Cases

A felony is a crime which carries a potential sentence of at least one year in prison. The first type of
felony case generally begins with an arrest. An arrested individual must appear before a magistrate
or justice of the peace within 24 hours for a determination as to whether there is sufficient reason to
believe the person committed an offense for which they can be lawfully arrested. This first hearing
is known as an initial appearance. These hearings currently are held without any counsel being
present. At the hearing, a decision is made regarding whether the individual should remain in
custody and if so what bond should be required for them to be released. If an individual requests
counsel during this first hearing, the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender is
appointed to represent the individual. The physical paperwork indicating that appointment is
forwarded by the court to the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender. The paperwork
is generally received between 12 and 72 hours later depending on the court. An individual who
remains in custody is entitled to a preliminary hearing7 within 10 days. An individual who is out of
custody is entitled to a preliminary hearing within 20 days.
For individuals that are appointed counsel a conflict check is performed to identify any potential
conflict of interests which would preclude representation by a member of the Law Offices of the
Mohave County Public Defender. If there is a conflict, the case is sent to either the Legal Defender,
or a private contract attorney, depending on whether the Legal Defender has a conflict or not. This
process takes roughly one business day depending on the volume of incoming cases. If the case is
retained within the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender it is immediately assigned to
the FasTrak supervisor. These cases are all assigned to the FasTrak unit in an attempt to achieve a
speedy disposition of the case. The FasTrak unit attempts to mirror the charging entities8 at the
Mohave County Attorney’s office and negotiate pleas, waiver-bind overs9, or dismissals. If none of
these resolutions can be achieved, then either the case proceeds to a contested preliminary hearing,
or the County Attorney may present the case to the Grand Jury for indictment.
The FasTrak supervisor immediately attempts to contact the appropriate charging entity within the
Mohave County Attorneys’ Office. The FasTrak supervisor and supporting secretaries attempt to
influence the appropriate deputy county attorney to forward all reports and law enforcement
documentation regarding the case as quickly as possible. Depending on the individual deputy
County Attorney this may occur within a day, or sometimes not for a week or more (in the instance
of a case being presented to the grand jury, reports may not be forwarded for several weeks or more ,
7

A preliminary hearing is a hearing at which a judge must make a determination as to whether there is probable
cause to believe that the individual has committed the offense that they are charged with. The hearing generally
consists of a law enforcement officer (who may, or may not, have been involved in the arrest and investigation of
the individual) detailing the arresting officers report to the court. The court must view any evidence presented by
the State in the light most favorable to sustaining a finding of probable cause.
8
A charging entity is the individual responsible for making charging decisions about a case. These decisions include
what statutory sections to allege have been violated, how the charging should proceed (by information to the
justice court, or grand jury presentation), what offers should be made to resolve the case early on (if any), and
whether law enforcement has provided sufficient information in reports to base a filing decision on in the first
place.
9
A felony case may only get to Superior Court if there has been a finding of probable cause made either by a Justice
of the Peace at a contested hearing, or by a grand Jury. The exception is that an individual may waive their right
to a probable cause determination and agree to have their case “bound over” to Superior court for all future
proceedings.

9

causing significant delay in the overall processing time and costs attributable to the case). The delay
in receiving reports prevents an attorney from having any meaningful discussion with a client due to
the lack of information as to the alleged evidence that would be presented against the client.
Ultimately, the goal of the FasTrak unit is to gather information to provide clients with appropriate
advice as early in the judicial process as possible and to resolve the status of a felony currently filed
in a justice court. This resolution may be achieved by pointing out deficiencies in evidence, or
investigation sufficient to convince a deputy county attorney to dismiss, either because of a lack of
evidence, or because a client is not guilty; pleading the client to a misdemeanor offer if appropriate;
having the client agree to waive their right to a preliminary hearing in exchange for a benefit offered
by the State10; or by conducting a contested preliminary hearing at which the State puts on evidence
and the defense may cross-examine on the issue of probable cause. If the court finds probable cause,
or the client waives their right to a preliminary hearing, the case is sent to Superior Court for all
further proceedings.
Felony cases are divided into two classifications in terms of internal administration. The first group
of cases is those which are filed in one of the five outlying Justice Courts11.
The second group of felony cases is known as original indictments. An original indictment is
generally a case in which an individual was not arrested and a complaint was never filed in a justice
court, but rather proceeds directly to Superior Court after the indictment is returned. In general,
these cases involve more complex factual issues which were presented to the grand Jury for
investigative or political reasons. A Mohave County OMB review of Grand Jury costs a year or so
back, indicated that each grand jury indictment costs the county approximately $250. The Law
Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender has attempted to reduce the number of grand jury
presentations by working more closely with the Mohave County Attorneys’ office, but this effort has
been only nominally successful. In a significant number of grand jury presentations attempts to
move a case to Superior Court through less expensive alternatives such as those previously
mentioned have been met by un-returned e-mails, phone calls or other attempts to resolve the
matters. Despite this resistance, the FasTrak supervisor remains tasked with attempting to minimize
the number of grand jury presentations by working jointly with the various charging entities. If the
grand jury finds probable cause to believe an individual committed a criminal offense the grand jury
returns a signed Indictment.
In FY 2007 there were a total of 3,490 felony cases to which an attorney was assigned. For fiscal
year 2007, the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender averaged 13 attorneys, the Legal
Defender averaged 5 and there were twenty-four indigent defense contract attorneys at the end of FY
2007.12 During FY 2007 the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender represented 1951
10

This benefit can be an offer to a sentencing stipulation which is less than the client is facing based on the charges,
an offer to plea to a lesser felony offense, a guarantee of probation if the client pleas to a felony, a reduced bond,
or release on their own recognizance.
11
Kingman, Cerbat, Bullhead City, Lake Havasu City and Moccasin are the 5 justice courts within Mohave County.
12
Christian C. Ackerley (Show Low), Lenore Knudtson (Kingman), Stephen R. Glazer (Flagstaff), David Goldberg
(Flagstaff), Shawn Hamp (Kingman), Sarah Heckathorne (Flagstaff), John W. Lovell (Tucson), Diane S. McCoy
(Flagstaff), Troy Messer (Kingman), Gail Natale (Phoenix), Geraldine Miller (Bullhead), Elana Sears (Kingman),
Jason Smith (Phoenix), Kathy Tuthill (Kingman) M. Alex Harris (Prescott), Michael J. Hruby (Williams), Cathy
Johnstone (Page), Thomas Jones (Lake Havasu City), Daniel B. Kaiser (Flagstaff), Rick Williams (Bullhead City),
Deborah A. Liverence (Kingman), Randolph Wolfson (Bullhead City), William Porter (Kingman), and Daniel
DeRienzo (Prescott).

10

felony defendants (56%), the Legal Defender represented 677 felony defendants (19%) and contract
attorneys represented 862 (25%). Most notable of these figures is the fact that the number of cases
sent to outside contractors grew by almost 50% during FY 07.
The total of 3490 felony cases, represents a 5.3% decrease in total felony cases handled over FY
2006.

2.

Juvenile Cases

Juvenile cases consist of juvenile delinquency cases (persons under the age of 18 charged with
crimes). Legal services are provided to the children whom are charged with criminal offenses.
A. Delinquent and Incorrigible Juveniles
A “Delinquent Juvenile” is a juvenile who committed an act which if committed by an adult would
be a criminal or petty offense. An “Incorrigible Juvenile” is one who has been adjudicated to have
committed an offense which can only be committed by a juvenile, such as refusing to obey one’s
parents, truancy, runaway, etc.
The number of delinquencies cases to which counsel was appointed decreased slightly from 683 in
FY 2006 to 618 in FY 2007 (a 9.5% decrease).
B. Dependencies
Currently legal representation for all parties to a juvenile dependency case is coordinated through the
Courts. The Court has separate contracts with private counsels which pay a set amount for a specific
number of cases. The Board of Supervisors has directed County Staff to review the efficacy of
implementing a contract administrator position and review methods of reducing the cost of providing
representation to indigent individuals in dependency actions. It has been discussed that this function
might be best handled by a legal services procurement officer who works for procurement, but is colocated with the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender. It is likely that the
representation of dependent children will become an additional area of responsibility for the Law
Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender in the future. It is anticipated that cost savings can
be accomplished, although contract counsel will always be required due to conflicts of interest in
representing adverse parties in a single action.
A "dependent child" is one who is:
1.

2.

3.

In need of proper and effective parental care and control and has no parent or
guardian, or the parent or guardian is not willing to exercise or incapable of
exercising care and control, or
a child who is destitute, or is not provided with the necessities of life, including
adequate food, clothing, shelter or medical care, or where the home is "unfit" by
reason of abuse, neglect, cruelty or depravity by a parent, guardian or other person
having care or custody of the child, or
A child who is incompetent or not restorable to competency and who is alleged to
have committed a serious offense.
11

The Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender is organized in a manner in which the
representation of parties to a dependency action will be handled by the organizational unit that
currently represents juvenile delinquency clients. There is a high level of cross-over between
juveniles accused of delinquent acts and those that the State13 seeks to declare dependent.

3. Misdemeanor Cases
A misdemeanor is an offense for which a sentence to a term of incarceration other than to the
custody of the department of corrections is authorized by state law. Jurisdiction for adjudicating
these offenses lies with the Justice Courts of Mohave County. Total misdemeanor case assignments
during FY 2007 were 2444 as compared to 2234 in FY 2006, an increase of 9.4 %. The highest
concentrations of cases in this area are driving under the influence and domestic violence related
cases.

4. Appeals and Post Conviction Relief Cases
This year there were 82 Appeals and Post Conviction Relief (PCR) cases filed as compared to 98 in
FY 2006. This is a reduction of 16 %. An appeal is a case which occurs automatically after a trial
results in the conviction of a defendant. Exceptions occur at the sole choice of the defendant and are
predominantly limited to instances where the defendant is convicted of only a very minor charge and
does not wish to remain entangled in the court system any longer than necessary. Post Conviction
Relief cases are filed pursuant to Criminal Rule of Procedure 32 and are essentially a claim that the
quality of legal representation was below professional standards. While information is anecdotal,
there is an obvious connection between the workload an attorney has and the perceived performance
each particular client has of that attorney’s ability to work their cause. Higher per attorney caseloads
inevitably result in a greater percentage of post-conviction relief proceedings. When you consider
that the case weighting is 2 for a post-conviction relief case (Requires attorney to review everything
that was originally done, re-do everything that was originally done, and evaluate whether the
methodology falls below professional standards) it is certainly less expensive to do it right the first
time.
For FY 2007, approximately 50% of the convictions or sentences were overturned and remanded
back to Mohave County for additional proceedings. This includes a reversal of a homicide
conviction that will now proceed to trial for the third time. This case was a contract case, and to date
has cost Mohave County in excess of $75,000.

13

Notably these cases are NOT handled by the County Attorney’s Office, but rather by the Attorney General’s
Office.

12

Part II - Indigent Defense Costs
The Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender was approximately 19% under authorized
budget for FY 2007. Most of these savings came from the inability to fill authorized attorney
positions.
ACCOUNTS FOR:
40110
40120
40130
40210
40230
40240
40260
41100
41140
41150
41400
43110
43115
43120
43177
43210
43215
43216
43230
43310
43312
43320
43325
43340
43430
43510
43530
43730
43810
43860
43910
43920
47910
47930
47990
GRAND
TOTAL

REGULAR SALARIES/WAGES
OVERTIME
TEMPORARY EMPLOYEES
EMP.BENE.-FICA
CTY.HEALTH INS.
WORKERS COMP
STATE RETIRE.
OFFICE SUPPLIES
COPIES/DUPL. SUPPLIES
DATA PROCESSING SUPPLIES
TOOLS & EQUIPMENT UNDER $1000
LEGAL SERVICES
INVESTIGATION FEES
DATA PROCESSING SERVICES
EDUCATIONAL ASSISTANCE
TELEPHONE
TELEPHONE COMPUTER DATA
CELL PHONE CHARGES
POSTAGE
TRAVEL EXPENSES
TRAVEL RECRUITING
MOTOR POOL CHGS.
VEHICLE REPLACEMENT
MOVING EXPENSES
JOB ADVERTISING
PRINTING EXP'S
COPIER CONTRACT
WATER EXPENSE
LEASE COMPUTER (IT ONLY)
BUILDING LEASES
R&M AUTOMOTIVE
R&M OFFICE EQUIP
COURT COSTS/INVESTIGATIONS
DUES,
SUBSCRIPTIONS/MEMBERSHIP
MISCELLANEOUS OTHER

ORIGINAL

REVISED

ACTUAL

BUDGET USED

1,970,789
0
1,000
150,765
274,680
2,956
179,342
10,562
3,600
2,640
2,000
220,000
8,307
59,018
24,000
25,440
3,089
2,100
5,500
4,040
3,100
16,111
7,236
27,000
330
1,595
7,534
480
23,431
5,100
480
550
5,013

1,970,789
0
1,000
150,765
274,680
2,956
179,342
10,562
3,180
2,640
2,000
220,000
8,307
59,018
24,000
25,440
3,089
2,100
5,500
6,735
4,627
16,111
7,236
25,473
80
1,595
7,534
480
23,431
5,100
480
550
21,737

1,560,467
349
10,548
117,583
174,131
2,156
139,511
8,175
1,225
4,109
1,397
249,463
4,096
59,018
8,051
26,092
3,089
2,169
4,991
6,603
5,002
16,768
7,236
12,751
0
1,026
7,296
696
23,431
4,897
55
137
24,018

79.2
100
1054.8
78
63.4
72.9
77.8
77.4
38.5
155.6
69.9
113.4
49.3
100
33.5
102.6
100
103.3
90.8
98
108.1
104.1
100
50.1
0
64.3
96.8
144.9
100
96
11.5
24.9
110.5

%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%

14,000
0

14,420
250

17,697
758

122.7
303.2

%
%

3061788

3081207

2504990.87

81.3

%

Table 2 – This table lists the totality of expenditures under the primary General Fund account which compromises
the main budget for the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender.

13

Cost per Case Analysis
The average cost per case for an appointed attorney from the Law Offices of the Mohave County
Public Defender was $671.16 during FY 2007. This is up about $82.57 per case from FY 2006, and
up $166.40 per case from FY 2005, but only up $ 164.01 from FY 2004. By comparison, the
average cost per case for an appointed attorney from the Legal Defender’s Office was $ 823.06 for
FY 2007, up only $0.94 from FY 2006. But up 100.32 from FY 2005 and up $ 131.57 from FY
2004. The average cost per case for the contract attorneys also rose for the third straight year to $
931.06 in FY 2007 versus $897.09 for FY 2006 (+ $34.07); $745.95 for FY 2005 (+$185.11);
$904.59 for FY 2004 (+$26.57); and $655.39 in FY 2003 (+$275.77). The significant jump in the
average cost of Public Defender cases during FY 2007 was due to the extraordinary number of
attorney interns that were unlicensed for a total of 142 weeks. This created a double expense for the
county. We were paying intern salaries (Roughly 65% of a licensed attorney) and still sending cases
out to contract. This meant that our overhead remained high, while our ability to keep more cases
was not impacted for a large portion of the year. The total number of cases which were required to
be sent to contract counsel grew by 20% from 1020 in FY 2006 to 1224 in FY 2007. The chart in
Figure 1 shows the comparative costs of the three delivery methods for FY 2007. The chart in
Figure 2 shows a five year comparison of the costs of the three delivery systems and the five year
average for all three systems. The chart in Figure 3 shows the change in the raw number of cases
handled through each delivery method over a five year period (FY 2003-2007).

Agency
PDO
LDO
Contract

Percentage of Funding by Provider Agency
FY 2003 FY 2004 FY 2005 FY 2006
59.3
65.2
65.1
54.6
24.3
22.3
24.0
21.8
16.4
12.5
10.8
23.6

FY 2007
56.1
19.8
24.1

Table 3 – This table shows the percentage of total indigent defense expenditures for Mohave County that were
attributable to each of the three delivery providers. It is reasonable to expect 65% of all funding to
be through the PDO, 15% to be to contracts and 20% to LDO in an optimal year.

It is important to comment briefly on the structure of the conflict contracts. Under the contract, a
private attorney can either accept, or decline an offered case. If they accept the case, the price is
established as a flat rate for the first 25 hours of work. There are minor exceptions which can reduce
the flat rate if the case resolves quickly. However, if the case exceeds 25 hours, the attorney simply
asks the court to order the contract administrator (currently the Public Defender) to pay an hourly
rate for all work beyond the 25th hour. Such converted hourly cases are generally a very small
percentage, but when they occur (generally in complex cases) the result is an extreme deviation to
the average cost.
The cost per case calculation is a little more complex than may first appear due to the fact that the
actual number of cases is derived based upon a weighted average. The reason for this is consistency.
Different types of cases as set forth in the Introduction require differing amounts of effort to perform
an effective job of representing accused persons. The contract system is set up to recognize this
difference by paying more for more complex cases and less for simpler ones. Similarly two
similarly paid staff attorneys can handle significantly different caseloads based on the complexity.
14

Therefore the cases are “weighted” to standardize the average work required per case and this
weighted figure is used to determine the average case cost.
The numbers speak for themselves. It cost the County more tax dollars, per case, to retain a contract
attorney than it does for a staff attorney to handle a case “in-house.” The reasons for this include 1)
economies of scale; 2) fixed salaried employees versus the variable cost of contract attorneys; 3)
centralized management; 4) improved record keeping; 5) organized division of labor; 6) a
centralized databank and 7) increased amount of state and federal funding. The costs for the Law
Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender are the lowest primarily because of economies of
scale that enable an organizational structure which provides a heightened level of efficiency, and
therefore, slightly higher caseloads per attorney without an accompanying increase in the time
required to provide effective representation.
It is important to note that a significant portion of the increased internal per case cost for FY 2007 is
attributable to the number of FTE attorney positions that were underfilled with Attorney Interns.
This equated to over $ 100,000 in salary that went to employees pending bar results who could not
handle a caseload. This means that the expense was raised without any parallel increase in the
ability to handle caseload during that period. The necessity to hire graduating law school students
due to a lack of an adequate licensed applicant pool causes this additional expense. If the employee
can be retained for a sufficient period of time after becoming licensed, this is a justifiable expense.
A priority for FY 08 and beyond needs to be to work with Human Resources and finance to derive a
break-even formula for recruiting these applicants, versus holding a position vacant and waiting for a
qualified applicant (lateral transfer). In the end analysis, it boils down to whether it is better to
gamble on an attorney intern passing the bar exam and staying a sufficient period to make the
investment in them worthwhile versus gambling on the unknown and unpredictability of waiting to
fill a vacancy with a qualified licensed attorney.

15

Part III - FY 2007 Highlights and Achievements
During FY 2007, technology invested in during FY 2002 was expanded upon. Automation played a
huge part in the ability to hold costs low while providing quality representation. By utilizing
automation capabilities, the average of 13 attorneys at the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public
Defender were required to plan to attend 25,041 court appearances during the year; this is an
incredible feat when you consider that in FY 06 there were only 21,523 court hearings attended by
15 attorneys.
Year
FY 05
FY 06
FY 07

Number of Attorneys
17
15
13

Number of hearings
18,910
21,523
25,041

Average # Hearings
1,112
1,435
1,926

Table 4 – This table illustrates the average number of hearings attended by a Public Defender licensed
attorney for FY 05-07. The significant increase in the average number of hearings is a indication of
workload issues which are likely to lead to stress, low morale and ineffective representation if
forced to be sustained over long periods of time.

During this same time period from FY 05 to FY 07 the number of cases which were retained by the
Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender actually went down by ten percent (10%) due to
reduced staffing. The increase in hearings is a corollary to attorneys being overloaded and not being
able to shepherd their assigned cases thru the legal system in a timely manner, resulting in more
continuances versus meaningful hearings.
Over 30,147 documents were created through an automated document assembly system which
retrieved data from the case management database. This is an increase of 1,000 documents from FY
2006. Each of these documents was created with a time savings of 30-120 seconds. Individually
this seems like a small amount, but collectively this is a time savings of 250 to 1,000 hours!
FY 2007 was a difficult year with respect to personnel. The year began very positively with 12
licensed attorneys and 2 Attorney Interns on staff. In addition 7 law school graduates who took the
Arizona Bar Examination in July of 2006 were scheduled to start between August and October of
2006. This appeared to present a full licensed staff by mid-year, depending on bar examination
results. Unfortunately, after the fiscal year began, the following unexpected changes in personnel
occurred:
1) one licensed attorney left the office to return to law enforcement (A long standing
goal) as the Deputy Director of the Mohave County Jail; 2) a young attorney moved
to Phoenix after her spouse obtained a job in the Phoenix area; 3) a young attorney
moved to Phoenix so that he and his significant other would be able to live in the
same city. This attorney had been commuting to Los Angeles virtually every
weekend for over a year to be with his significant other; 4) a young attorney left the
office to work for the Legal Defender’s Office; 5) a young intern failed the bar
examination and left prior to results being posted for her second examination to
return to Nebraska. 6) a young attorney went to work for the City of Kingman City
16

Attorney’s Office; 7) one of the newly licensed interns left the office to go to work
for the City of Kingman City Attorney’s Office; 8) one of the newly licensed
attorney interns left the office to return to Sacramento, CA to pursue a clerking
opportunity with a federal court; and 9) one of the newly licensed attorney interns
left the office to work for the County Attorney’s office.
At this point in the fiscal year, while we had anticipated a staffing of 19 out of 20 professional
positions, we were faced with only 10 of 20 authorized positions. Fortunately we were able to hire a
local attorney with almost a decade of experience who had been serving as a contract provider, and
an experienced public defender from Kentucky (roughly 10 years) who took the July 2007 Arizona
bar Examination. This left us with 12 of 20 professional positions filled at the end of the fiscal year,
and an average of 13 licensed attorneys over the course of the fiscal year. During the beginning of
the 3rd quarter of the fiscal year, we issued offers of employment to another round of law school
graduates. All total we issued 6 offers of employment to May 2007 law school graduates, all of
whom began their employment in the first quarter of fiscal 2008. These individuals came from
Harvard University, University of Cincinnati (2), Franklin Pierce Law School (New Hampshire),
University of Seattle, and SUNY Buffalo.
Subsequent to the approval of the Loan Repayment and Relocation Assistance Programs by the
Board of Supervisors in January of 2006, interest in positions with the Law Offices of the Mohave
County Public defender has grown phenomenally. In previous years an average annual total of
applications would be roughly two dozen. By contrast since the implementation of these programs,
the number of applications from 3rd year law students has been at or above 200 each successive year.
The first of the employees recruited under these programs will become eligible for participation in
the second quarter of Fiscal year 2009. Of the initial 7 who were recruited under these programs, one
failed to pass the Arizona Bar Examination twice and is no longer with the office, of the remaining ,
one left the office to work at the City of Kingman City Attorneys Office as a prosecutor
(Subsequently left there and now works for the County Attorney’s office as a prosecutor), a second
one left to work for the County Attorney’s Office as a prosecutor, and a third one left Kingman to
return to Sacramento (stated reasons were spousal dissatisfaction with the area, and a prestigious
federal clerkship in Sacramento). Three remain with the office. This equates to 50% retention after
one year (Not counting the individual who was disqualified from employment due to not passing the
Arizona bar Examination twice). In Fiscal 2007, 7 combined offers were made to 6 3rd year law
students and one experienced public defender from another state. At the time of writing this report,
all are employed by the office. These individual were chosen from over 150 applications and 26 on
site interviews. These individuals came from a diverse geographic area encompassing New
Hampshire, Washington, Ohio (2), Kentucky, Massachusetts and New York. Of the seven
individuals who accepted employment in March of 2007, 6 sat for the July 2007 bar with 4 passing
(passing rate for the examination was 76.1%). The remaining three are scheduled to take the
February 2008 Bar Examination.
While it is still too early to validate the efficacy of the new Loan and Relocation programs as a
retention tool, it is unquestionable that they have been instrumental in being an invaluable asset to
recruiting. The plans will need to be extended for an additional period to validly assess the impact.
It is recommended that the plan be extended for an additional 5 years. The total cost of both
programs for Fiscal Year 2007 was roughly $ 20,000.
17

As we went into the budget process for FY 2007, plans had begun to renovate and move into the
historic St. Johns church. Actual renovation began in the last part of FY 2006 and was completed in
March of 2007. The office relocated and was fully operational in the new facility by the end of
March 2007. The morale of the office has significantly improved since the move into the new
facilities. While the facilities are not spacious, they were designed to maximize the use of space and
provide for organizational functionality. With the ability to conduct management, team and even
departmental meetings within the facility, communication has vastly improved (this has resulted in a
significant decrease in gossip and rumors among office personnel). Anecdotally, at least one
individual who was previously actively seeking to change jobs to another locale, now reports
“loving” her job despite the social challenges posed by the geographic region.
Appropriate caseloads and staffing have a definite role in the level of stress and accompanying job
satisfaction felt by employees. In FY 2007 the professional staff in the office handled 3359 felony
equivalent cases (Weighted Cases). Pursuant to Joe U. Smith standards, this should have been
handled by 22.4 attorneys, however the load was borne by an average of 13 attorneys over the course
of the fiscal year. The number of weighted cases retained internally in fiscal year 2007 was roughly
300 less than in fiscal year 2006 which corresponds to a reduction in the average number of
attorneys of almost two from fiscal year 2006. A total of 597 felonies (weighting factor of 1), 24
juveniles (weighting factor of .75, for a weighted load of 18 felony equivalents), 49 misdemeanors
(weighting factor of .375, for a weighted load of 18 felony equivalents), and 142 probation violation
cases (weighting factor of .375, for a weighted load of 55 felony equivalents) were sent out to
“overflow” contractors. These 688 felony equivalent cases could have been handled by the public
defenders office if appropriate resources and staffing had been available.
Overflow Case Type
Felony
Misdemeanor
Juvenile
Probation Violation
Total

Raw Number
597
49
24
142

Conversion
1
.375
.75
.375

Net Weighted Cases
597
18
18
55
688

Table 5- This table shows the conversion factors for the cases which were sent to “overflow” contract counsel
during FY 2007. These are cases which could have, and should have been handled by in-house
attorneys on the Public Defender staff, but for lack of authorizations and staff. The weighted
number must be added back into the number of cases actually handled to make projections on
needed staff to fully perform the Public Defender function at optimal levels (resulting in lower
average and overall per case costs!).

Adding the 688 weighted cases to the 3359 actually handled, equates to a need to handle 4,047
felony cases in fiscal year 2007. To appropriately handle this number of cases, 27 attorneys
would have been required. A staffing of 27 attorneys would also require three supervisors to
maintain appropriate levels of supervision, or a total of 30 authorized professional staff
members.
During Fiscal 2007, the office was only authorized 20 attorneys, including
supervisors, for a net deficit of 10 positions. The longer the County goes without addressing
adequate staffing, the harder it will be in the future to catch up. By ignoring the dilemma, we
are setting ourselves up as a county for a major legal issue with the provision of indigent
18

defense in the coming years.
Failure to provide staff authorizations, and the tools to recruit and retain are simply a shifting of
costs from one area to another. Instead of paying for employees, and recruiting and retention
programs, we have historically systematically recruited who we can, gotten whatever work we could
from them, and then allowed them to burnout and fall to the wayside as replacements were recruited.
The soft and hard dollars that go into sustaining this process need to be utilized to create and sustain
a more positive system. A positive system will exist when appropriately professional work
environment, proper staffing levels, and proper support staffing levels are all in place. The
continuation of current recruiting and retention tools which recognize that it is difficult to recruit and
retain public defenders will be key to continuing to move forward toward a system that will become
self sustaining and effective on both a tangible fiscal and intangible performance basis.
Phyllis H. Subin, Esq. was engaged to conduct an assessment of the Law Offices of the Mohave
County Public Defender, during the second quarter of FY 2007. The assessment included a review
of internal and external records and data regarding the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public
Defender, data from the Justice and Superior Court reports from the National Center for State Courts
(NCSC), and on the ground interviews with employees, judicial personnel, prosecution personnel
and county finance, human resource and OMB personnel. Ms. Subin issued her Assessment in
March of 2007. The Assessment is attached as Attachment A. The Assessment identified areas of
organizational structure that were in need of improvement as well as challenges to supervision and
training that needed to be overcome. Virtually all of the recommended improvements have been
implemented as of the writing of this report, to include a Board of Supervisor approved reorganization of management structure within the office. The report also identified recruiting and
retention challenges. Among the most notable challenges to retention were job stress (amplified by
the loss of personnel, or the knowledge that certain employees were actively seeking other
employment), lack of a defined career path, lack of quality training, lack of a defined leadership
structure in the absence of the Public Defender, and inequities in recognition of work and in work
assignments. While job stress is always present, continued monitoring and better control over
workloads and assignments has been implemented to better balance workload among qualified
individuals. An attempt to better define what career path is available within the office has been
made through the formalization of a new organizational structure in the office. A fixed well defined
leadership structure clearly identifies the leadership hierarchy as well. Lastly the re-organization has
included the designation of a formal Training Director (with other supervisory duties) who will have
primary responsibility for internal training programs. A highly qualified individual is expected to
begin employment in the 3rd quarter of FY 2008.

Part IV – Human Resources / Participation in Loan Repayment and
Relocation Assistance Programs
Human Resources –
FY 2007 began very positively with 12 licensed attorneys and 2 Attorney Interns on staff. In
addition 7 law school graduates who took the Arizona Bar Examination in July of 2006 were
scheduled to start between August and October of 2006. This appeared to present a full licensed
19

staff by mid-year, depending on bar examination results. Unfortunately, after the fiscal year began,
the following unexpected changes in personnel occurred:
1) one licensed attorney left the office to return to law enforcement (A long standing
goal) as the Deputy Director of the Mohave County Jail; 2) a young attorney moved
to Phoenix after her spouse obtained a job in the Phoenix area; 3) a young attorney
moved to Phoenix so that he and his significant other would be able to live in the
same city. This attorney had been commuting to Los Angeles virtually every
weekend for over a year to be with his significant other; 4) a young attorney left the
office to work for the Legal Defender’s Office; 5) a young intern failed the bar
examination and left prior to results being posted for her second examination to
return to Nebraska. 6) a young attorney went to work for the City of Kingman City
Attorney’s Office; 7) one of the newly licensed interns left the office to go to work
for the City of Kingman City Attorney’s Office; 8) one of the newly licensed
attorney interns left the office to return to Sacramento, CA to pursue a clerking
opportunity with a federal court; and 9) one of the newly licensed attorney interns
left the office to work for the County Attorney’s office.
By the end of the fiscal year, while we had anticipated a staffing of 19 out of 20 professional
positions, we were faced with only 10 of 20 authorized positions filled. Fortunately we were able to
hire a local attorney with almost a decade of experience who had been serving as a contract provider,
and an experienced public defender from Kentucky (roughly 10 years) who took the July 2007
Arizona Bar Examination. This left us with 12 of 20 professional positions filled at the end of the
fiscal year, and an average of 13 licensed attorneys on average over the course of the fiscal year.
During the beginning of the 3rd quarter of the fiscal year, we issued offers of employment to another
round of law school graduates. All total we issued 6 offers of employment to May 2007 law school
graduates, all of whom began their employment in the first quarter of fiscal 2008. These individuals
came from Harvard University, University of Cincinnati (2), Franklin Pierce Law School (New
Hampshire), University of Seattle, and SUNY Buffalo.
Of the nine professional staff employees who left during the fiscal year, four relocated and cited
problems with work force, or lifestyle as a factor in their decision, two went to work for the City of
Kingman City Attorney’s Office at higher pay, one went directly to work for the County Attorney’s
office, one went to work for the Legal Defender’s office, and one went to work for the Mohave
County Sheriff’s Office.
All of the individuals who were hired in FY 2007 participated in the relocation assistance program.
Those who left employment were required to pay back virtually all of the assistance they received.
This resulted in only about 50% of the original relocation budget being utilized during the course of
the fiscal year.
To date, no employee who was recruited under the Loan Repayment Assistance Program has yet to
qualify. The first employee that will qualify will not qualify until approximately May of 2008. An
extension of the LRAP and relocation programs for a minimum of 5 years will be sought in order to
allow for sufficient program participation to evaluate whether it will have the desired impact on
retention. The impact on recruiting is clearly a positive and if for no other reason than that, should
20

be continued. The total cost of the LRAP program was under $ 9,000 for FY 2007.

FY
2002
FY
2003
FY
2004
FY
2005
FY
2006
FY
2007
Totals

Attorneys/ Number
Interns July Attorneys/
1
Interns
departing
10/0
3

Number
Attorneys/
Interns
hired
4

Net
Change

Participation Participation Average
in
in LRAP
Years of
Relocation
Experience

+1

N/A

N/A

11

10/2

3/1

6/5

+7

N/A

N/A

7.75

18/0

4/0

2/0

-2

N/A

N/A

8.75

16/0

4/0

3/0

-1

N/A

N/A

10.2

15/0

9/0

6/2

-1

8

N/A

9.18

12/2

7/4

2/7

-2

9

30/5

23/14

+4

8

5.14
N/A

8.77

Table 6 – This table shows the shift in professional staffing levels on an annual basis.

Since reliable records began to be kept in October of 2001, the average professional employee of the
Law offices of the Mohave County Public Defender has worked in the office for 1.8 years. This
calculation does NOT take into consideration time that employees spent with the office prior to
October of 2001! The first year in which professional staff employees were recruited using the Loan
Repayment Assistance program (LRAP) and Relocation Assistance Programs was FY 2007. While
it is still too early to gather sufficient data to provide a statistically relevant analysis, to date the
retention figures fore this class are the highest of any recruiting group for which data is available.
YEAR
HIRED
FY 2003
FY 2004
FY 2005
FY 2006
FY 2007

Avg. Length of Service
(YRS)
2.0
3.0
1.1
1.0
.9

% who left prior to 2 Percentage Remaining on
years
Staff
45.5%
18.2
50%
0
100%
0
88.9%
11.1
44.4%
55.6

Table 7 – This table shows the average length of service by recruiting year, the percentage of recruit who left
county service prior to the end of their initial 2 year period, and the percentage who still remain on
staff. The FY 2006 and FY 2007 numbers could change if any of the remaining employees leaves
prior to the end of their second full year.

Part V – Conclusion (Challenges and Trends for the Future)
Systemically the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender is light years ahead of where it
21

was in FY 2001. Organizational structure and technological advances have been put in place which
can allow near optimal human efficiencies. The lack and delay of providing appropriate physical
facilities has caused a significant setback in the advancement of the organization as one which can
become self-sustaining. However the occupation of the newly renovated facility has been
instrumental in assisting in a significant turn around of staff morale. Personnel losses prior to the
occupation of the new facility and re-organization of the Department caused a significant set back,
however with moral, staffing and organization significantly improved, the future looks very bright.
It remains imperative to avoid a knee-jerk reaction to simply hire “bodies” to fill chairs and create
additional problems down the line and it is therefore imperative that caseloads be maintained with
professional standards. This will require that cases which can not be absorbed by remaining staff
due to numbers or experience be sent to outside private contract counsel. Without the addition of
appropriate staffing to handle the incoming cases while maintaining ethical caseload/workload
limits, it will be necessary to continue to rely heavily on outside contract counsel, even if full
staffing is achieved within the office. This could easily result in a projected contract budget for
“overflow” cases of close to $ 1 million dollars yet again. In order to not exacerbate the use of
private counsel at higher cost, it will be imperative to approve and allow for the recruiting of
additional FTE staff to maintain professional standards and limit liability to the County. It is
important to note that if the County knowingly fails to provide effective counsel by maintaining a
system which is known to be ineffective, the county can be held civilly liable for under 42 U.S. C. §
1983 (See, Miranda v. Clark County, 319 F.3d 465, 03 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 1037, 2003 Daily
Journal D.A.R. 1353 (9th Cir.(Nev.) (Feb 03, 2003), certiorari denied by Clark County, NV v.
Hernandez Miranda, 540 U.S. 814, 124 S.Ct. 64, 157 L.Ed.2d 28, 71 USLW 3724, 72 USLW 3206,
72 USLW 3235 (U.S. Oct 06, 2003) and Powers v. Hamilton County Public Defender Comm., 2004
FED App. 0288P (6th Cir.) (August 29, 2007).
On the positive side, the newest group of law school recruits has formed an outstanding alliance to
the office and one another. Each has adapted well to Kingman, Mohave County and the office.
However, since the budget does not become final until August, which is well beyond the end of the
recruiting season, it will be imperative that a commitment be made prior to the finalization of the
budget as to what staffing levels will be allowed for FY 2009. Additionally, it is imperative that the
relocation and LRAP programs be continued for another 5 year period. The program has yet to be
truly implemented for any of the recruits who were recruited under the original plan. In order to
conduct a proper assessment of the fiscal benefit of the plan, a much longer term study is necessary.
If the positive aspects of the issues raised and addressed in this report can be enhanced and followed
through on, the future looks bright for all of the citizenry of Mohave County to know that the justice
system in Mohave County will be fair and that they can have faith in the integrity of the results of
that system. Failure to follow through is likely to result in continued depletion of quality attorneys
in the government defense offices which will result in a significantly lower quality of representation
at a higher cost. Lower quality representation as discussed will result in additional costs beyond the
initial contract cost of representation due to the potential for an increase in post-conviction relief
cases and civil liability.
All in all FY 2008 looks to be a turning point (although not without its’ challenges). If a
commitment to continuing the positive changes can be carried through on, Mohave County will be
well on its’ way to having an Indigent Defense system which will ensure that every citizen of
22

Mohave County can view the justice system with confidence and pride.

23

Appendix A - Where the Numbers Come From and What They Represent
In order to best analyze the caseload statistics, it is important to understand where the numbers came from and
what the numbers represent.
The caseload/crime statistics contained in this report were compiled from the Public Defender case
management database known as Justware. This database was implemented in 2001 and was designed to
track caseload information at several different levels. Because many crimes are unreported and because many
crimes are not solved, the numbers compiled in this report in no way reflect the crime rate in Mohave County.
Those figures should be obtained from law enforcement agencies. Similarly, not every reported crime, or
arrest becomes a case, so the internal case data is unlikely to directly reflect local law enforcement data.
In addition, the figures represent the number of individuals charged with a crime, not necessarily the number
of cases filed in the Superior Court. For example, when a crime is committed by multiple defendants our
office records the number of defendants. This is because each defendant will need a lawyer. The Superior
Court and the County Attorney, on the other hand, may record that case as a single filing. For this reason, our
statistics may differ from those of the Superior Court and the County Attorney.
It is also helpful to understand that the type of crimes recorded represent the crimes as charged (ie: assault,
theft, etc.), and not the ultimate disposition (not the crime to which the defendant was found guilty of, pled to,
or was acquitted of). Many defendants plead to lesser offenses. Sometimes felonies are reduced to
misdemeanors or dismissed outright. Sometimes defendants are found not guilty by a jury. For the purpose
of staffing, management and planning analysis it is important to know what a defendant is charged with
initially. It is the initial charge which determines whether counsel is appointed and how much the County
must ultimately spend for the defense.
In addition, the crime figures mentioned in this report reflect only the main crime charged. Many defendants
are charged with multiple offenses arising out of a single act. For example, a defendant may be charged with
Possession of Marijuana, Possession of Marijuana with Intent to Sell, Possession of Drug Paraphernalia and
Underage Drinking. The following statistics would reflect only the main charge, to wit, Possession with
Intent to Sell. If we counted all of the multiple charges which the prosecutor decided to file, analysis would
prove meaningless, because indigent defense attorneys are not compensated based upon the number of
charges filed.
Finally, our statistics reflect only charges filed against indigent defendants. We estimate that 95% of all
persons charged with felony and juvenile offenses are found to be indigent and are provided counsel through
the Law Offices of the Mohave County Public Defender.

24

Appendix B - Breakdown of Most Prevalent Crimes for FY 2007 By Charge
Statute and Description
13-3415 – Possession of Drug Paraphernalia
13-3407 – Possession of Dangerous Drugs
13-901.C – Probation Violation/Petition to Revoke
13-3405 – Possession of Marijuana
28-1381.A.1 – DUI
28-3473 – Driving w/ DL Suspended
13-1204.A.2 – Aggravated Assault
13-2904/13-3601 – Disorderly Conduct by DV
28-1381.A.2 – DUI .08%
13-1203.A.1 – Assault by Domestic Violence
13-2904 – Disorderly Conduct
13-1814 – Theft of means of Transportation
13-2506 – Failure to Appear
13-1602 – Criminal Damage
13-1506 – Burglary in the Third Degree
28-1383.A.1 – Aggravated DUI
28-1382.A – Extreme DUI
13-3102 – Misconduct involving Weapons
13-2002 – Forgery

Number of cases involving
1495
544
510
472
358
351
306
269
236
227
170
166
163
159
154
153
144
143
141

Table 8 – This table is solely based on the number of cases in which the listed charge appears. It is possible for a
single case to contain multiple charges, and therefore the numbers can NOT be used to calculate caseloads.

General Category Breakdown14
Type of Crime
Primary Drug
Assault/Disorderly Conduct
Probation Violation
Domestic Violence
DUI
Theft
Criminal Damage
Vehicle Violations
Burglary
Forgery
Theft of means of Transportation
False Reporting/Obstruction
Flight/Escape
Trespass
Weapons Violations

Number
1,513
1,087
687
649
557
467
244
243
233
202
180
134
125
110
104

14

This represents the total number of cases in which this particular type of charge was included. The total number of cases is
not reflected as many cases have two or more charges from more than one general category. Similarly, the general category
does not distinguish between misdemeanor and felony charges in this table. This table is provided solely to provide a general
overview of the type of charges filed and defended, NOT necessarily the severity of the charges. The severity of Charges is
more accurately reflected in the number of felony, misdemeanor, juvenile, probation violation, post-conviction relief and
appellate cases received which appears elsewhere in this report.

25

Animal Violations
Shoplifting
Sex Offenses
Failure to Appear
Child Abuse/Neglect
Post Conviction Relief
Planning & Zoning Violations
Hindering Prosecution
Appeals
Contempt
Arson Related
Homicide
Contracting without a License
Criminal Littering
Kidnapping/Imprisonment
Wildlife Violations

89
85
87
59
55
55
38
28
22
21
18
17
17
16
10
5

Table 9 – This table lists charges by major category. The number represents the number of cases in which one or
more of the type of charges appeared. Individual cases often contain multiple charges and these
numbers therefore should NOT be used to attempt to calculate caseload numbers.

26

Appendix C - Detailed Budget Report

40110
40120
40130
40210
40230
40240
40260
41100
41140
41150
41400
43110
43115
43120
43177
43210
43215
43216
43230
43310
43312
43320
43325
43340
43430
43510
43530
43730
43810
43860
43910
43920
47910
47930
47990
GRAND
TOTAL

REGULAR SALARIES/WAGES
OVERTIME
TEMPORARY EMPLOYEES
EMP.BENE.-FICA
CTY.HEALTH INS.
WORKERS COMP
STATE RETIRE.
OFFICE SUPPLIES
COPIES/DUPL. SUPPLIES
DATA PROCESSING SUPPLIES
TOOLS & EQUIPMENT UNDER $1000
LEGAL SERVICES
INVESTIGATION FEES
DATA PROCESSING SERVICES
EDUCATIONAL ASSISTANCE
TELEPHONE
TELEPHONE COMPUTER DATA
CELL PHONE CHARGES
POSTAGE
TRAVEL EXPENSES
TRAVEL RECRUITING
MOTOR POOL CHGS.
VEHICLE REPLACEMENT
MOVING EXPENSES
JOB ADVERTISING
PRINTING EXP'S
COPIER CONTRACT
WATER EXPENSE
LEASE COMPUTER (IT ONLY)
BUILDING LEASES
R&M AUTOMOTIVE
R&M OFFICE EQUIP
COURT COSTS/INVESTIGATIONS
DUES,
SUBSCRIPTIONS/MEMBERSHIP
MISCELLANEOUS OTHER

REVISED

1,970,789
0
1,000
150,765
274,680
2,956
179,342
10,562
3,600
2,640
2,000
220,000
8,307
59,018
24,000
25,440
3,089
2,100
5,500
4,040
3,100
16,111
7,236
27,000
330
1,595
7,534
480
23,431
5,100
480
550
5,013

1,970,789
0
1,000
150,765
274,680
2,956
179,342
10,562
3,180
2,640
2,000
220,000
8,307
59,018
24,000
25,440
3,089
2,100
5,500
6,735
4,627
16,111
7,236
25,473
80
1,595
7,534
480
23,431
5,100
480
550
21,737

1,560,467
349
10,548
117,583
174,131
2,156
139,511
8,175
1,225
4,109
1,397
249,463
4,096
59,018
8,051
26,092
3,089
2,169
4,991
6,603
5,002
16,768
7,236
12,751
0
1,026
7,296
696
23,431
4,897
55
137
24,018

79.2
100
1054.8
78
63.4
72.9
77.8
77.4
38.5
155.6
69.9
113.4
49.3
100
33.5
102.6
100
103.3
90.8
98
108.1
104.1
100
50.1
0
64.3
96.8
144.9
100
96
11.5
24.9
110.5

%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
%

14,000
0

14,420
250

17,697
758

122.7
303.2

%
%

3,081,207

2504990

81.3

%

3,061,788

27

ACTUAL

BUDGET
USED

ORIGINAL

Appendix D - Cost per Case Analysis using Weighting Factors
Caseload Counts FY 2007
Raw Number

Conversion
Factor

Weighted
Cases

PDO
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations

1946
1951
423
57
25
259

Subtotal

0.375
1
0.75
2
6
0.375

729.75
1951
317.25
114
150
97.125
3359

4661

FY '07 Budget
Per case Weighted Cost
(Actual Expenditures)

$2,254,525.39

$671.16

$797,030.02

$823.06

LDO
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations
Rejected

418
677
87
0
0
185

0.375
1
0.75
2
6
0.375

156.75
677
65.25
0
0
69.375

11

Subtotal

1367

968.375

Private Contract
Misdemeanor
Felony
Juvenile
PCR
Appeals
Probation Violations

80
862
108
1
0
173

Subtotal

1224

1039.875

$968,285.43

$931.16

Total

7252

5367.375

$4,019,840.84

$748.94

0.375
1
0.75
2
6
0.375

28

30
862
81
2
64.875

Indigent Defense Provider Cost Per Weighted
Case FY '07
Average

$808.46

Contract

$931.16

LDO

$823.06

PDO

$671.16
$0.00

$100.00

$200.00

$300.00

$400.00

$500.00

$600.00

$700.00

$800.00

$900.00

$1,000.00

Figure 1 – This Chart illustrates the average cost per case for all three forms of legal service providers, as well as the average
for all services for fiscal year 2007.

29

Indigent Defense Provider Cost per
Weighted Case FY 03 - FY 07
$808.46
$769.27
$657.82
$701.08
$632.30

Average

$931.16
$897.09

Contract

$745.95
$904.59
$655.39

FY 2007
FY 2006
FY 2005

$823.06
$822.12
$722.74
$691.49
$767.68

LDO

$671.16
$588.59
$504.76
$507.15
$473.84

PDO
$0.00

$200.00

$400.00

$600.00

$800.00

$1,000.00

Figure 2 – This Chart shows an annual comparison for all three indigent defense provider
systems and the average for the county provided service.

30

FY 2004
FY 2003

Raw Cases Handled by Fiscal year
6000
5000

PDO
LDO
Contracts
Linear (PDO)
Linear (LDO)
Linear (Contracts)

4000
3000
2000
1000
0
03

04

05

06

07

Figure 3 – This chart shows the growth in the volume of raw cases handled by the respective service provider
systems within Mohave County. General decreases in the number of outside contract case assignments
is a result of more stringent conflict review, and greater internal efficiencies and optimization of
resources. Recent increases in the number of outside contract case assignments is a result of staffing
shortages coupled with increased overall case filings.

31