As Baltimore City Public Schools resumed in-person learning after going virtual at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Assistant Public Defender Sherie Scott found herself at the Edward F. Borgerding Court Building on Wabash Avenue in 2022 representing 10 parents whose children had racked up unexcused absences.

She said she asked for postponements and tried everything she knew how to do to rectify the situation. The judge, she said, sentenced three parents to jail time.

Scott said she needed space and time to breathe after court wrapped up. She said did her best but felt that the outcome could have been so much different.

“You begin to feel you’re not able to put in the time and the resources for each individual client,” said Scott, who was recently promoted to the Felony Trial Division in Baltimore. “The Constitution guarantees effective counsel. Are we able to be as effective as we could be because we have so many cases?”

“It is emotional. You’re dealing with people’s lives,” she added. “It’s a hard job. I love it. But it’s hard.”

To meet new national standards for workloads, the Maryland Office of the Public Defender calculated in its 2023 annual report that it would need to increase the number of attorneys who represent clients in adult criminal cases alone more than threefold. That’s not counting assistant public defenders in specialized divisions as well as paralegals, investigators and social workers.

“The reality is we do not have sufficient staffing,” Maryland Public Defender Natasha Dartigue told reporters during a recent media briefing. “The current workloads are not sustainable,” she added toward the end of the presentation.

The story continues at The Baltimore Banner: Maryland doesn’t have enough public defenders. Here’s what they say they need.

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