Vol. 72, No. 12, December 1999

Serving the Public

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SPD Promotes
Democratic Ideals, Internationally

Most of the people in the group had read about public defender systems in the United States, but had never seen them in operation, points out Moshe Hacohen, chief district public defender in the Jerusalem office. Hacohen is one of the few among the visitors who has had prior direct experience with the U.S. system. He studied public defender programs in the states under a scholarship and worked for a time in the Washington, D.C., public defender office.

"One of the concepts I knew about, but that is novel to the others in our group," Hacohen says, "is the use of investigators and social workers in public defender cases. People theoretically know about that, but when you see it in action, it's different. It gives us encouragement to lobby and press for that" back in Israel.

Other key differences between the Israeli and Wisconsin approaches exist. For instance, the Israeli office works much more closely with its 600 assigned private bar counsel, who handle 95 percent of the total public defender caseload. "In our system, the assigned counsel are actually agents of our office," Mann explains. His agency hopes to expand its staff (currently 50 attorneys in five district offices) in coming years and thus be able to bring the staff/private bar caseload mix to roughly 50/50.

Despite differences between the systems, Mann feels he and his staff learn a great deal from their Wisconsin partnership. "I think our biggest challenge in Israel is learning how to create a cost-effective way of supervising a large number of attorneys and a large number of cases, [while also] giving quality services," he says. "For that purpose, we came to Wisconsin, which has a high quality public defender office and a highly developed managerial sector."

Give and Take

Mann also cites specific ideas he feels his agency can implement in Israel. One example is fee collection from clients, based on what they can afford to pay. Israel has only begun to set up such a program. "We have learned a lot about that here," Mann says. "We've learned that we can get some income from the client population. It's not going to cover a large part of our budget, but even a small part would allow our office to do some things we might not otherwise be able to do. Also, when the client pays something, there's more respect for the service."

Besides specific program ideas, visitors say they're leaving with general impressions, which can be equally helpful back on the job. Dori Pinto, deputy national public defender, says he's impressed by the systematic way the Wisconsin office trains lawyers. "Another thing," he adds, "is that there are so many experienced lawyers here who have been [public defenders] for 10, 15, or 20 years. And they want to stay. That's something for us to think about."

First assistant to the national public defender David Weiner agrees. "There's a kind of professionalism here that we don't have yet because we're new to this business," he notes. "It's exciting to see people who have been in this profession for a while, and have gone through all the things we're probably still going to go through. The people who do this work have a tremendous sense of mission, and they enjoy it. [We have met] people who still feel that way after all these years. We're going to try to keep that 30 years from now ... to figure out the secret of keeping that flame burning."

If the Israeli visitors took home a dose of inspiration, they also left some behind. "This is exciting," Chiarkas says of his staff members' involvement with their Israeli counterparts, "because we're all united in the idea that poor people should be treated fairly in court, whether it's here in Wisconsin or in Beersheba."

Dianne Molvig operates Access Information Service, a Madison research, writing, and editing service. She is a frequent contributor to area publications.