By Erica C. Barnett
Anita Khandelwal, the director of King County’s Department of Public Defense since 2018, resigned abruptly on Wednesday; her last day will be October 4. She announced the news to staff in a brief email this morning, saying, “I am proud of my small role in helping build a community where we show our clients and each other compassion in the face of a system that has none. I will always reflect on our work together with awe and humility there is no place like DPD, and to have been part of it is my good fortune.” The email did not provide any explanation for Khandelwal’s decision or details about her future plans.
Her deputy director, Gordon Hill, will go back to being a supervising attorney at the Associated Counsel for the Accused (ACA), a division of DPD. Matt Sanders, who joined the then-independent ACA as an intern in 2011 and is currently one of four managing attorneys for the division, will replace Khandelwal on an interim basis; officially, he’ll be taking over Hill’s old job and will not have his own deputy director.
The process for appointing Khandelwal’s permanent replacement is somewhat convoluted and will likely take months.
Khandelwal declined, through a DPD spokesman, to speak to PubliCola about her decision to quit the department; according to multiple sources, she said she was exhausted after leading DPD for the last six years, including during the COVID pandemic. Khandelwal has long been a vocal advocate against policies that penalize vulnerable people for crimes that are often related to poverty and addiction, including a recently passed law criminalizing public drug use, laws creating new drug and sex-work banishment zones, and City Attorney Ann Davison’s unilateral decision to shut down the local Community Court..
In 2022, the King County Council reappointed Khandelwal on a narrow 5-4 vote.
In an email to staff this morning, Hill wrote, “Working in the Director’s Office for Anita for the last 5 years has been the greatest adventure and privilege of my life; at the same time, this position has pulled me a long way from working directly with DPD’s clients and the legal work that brought me to public defense in 2005 when I first began at ACA. I’m excited to set aside the administrative work of the Director’s Office and re-immerse myself in direct service of public defense. I’m equally excited to see the fresh ideas and bold vision that a new person will bring to the role.”
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Khandelwal’s decisions at DPD have, at times, been internally contentious; earlier this year, Khandelwal withdrew from discussions about the city’s then-pending contract with the South Correctional Entity, a jail in Des Moines, saying there was no point in participating because Mayor Bruce Harrell wouldn’t listen to her questions and concerns. The decision to withdraw from the conversation about the jail was unpopular with some DPD employees, who wanted the department to be at the table even if the jail contract was a foregone conclusion.
Khandelwal’s departure comes at a time when the department is preparing to seek county funds to hire potentially hundreds of new attorneys and support staff to reduce caseloads that are widely considered unsustainable. Next week, the Washington State Supreme Court will hold a public hearing on proposed new maximum caseloads for public defenders, which the Washington State Bar Association’ Council on Public Defense (CPD) proposed earlier this year.
Unlike prosecutors, who choose which and how many cases to prosecute, public defenders must provide legal counsel in every case they receive. Under the current WSBA standards, each public defender is expected to handle as many as 150 felony cases or 400 misdemeanor cases a year—a workload that works out to as little as 11 hours per felony, or 4.5 hours per misdemeanor. The proposed new standards would reduce those caseloads and change the way caseloads are determined to better reflect how much time attorneys and staff actually spend on each type of case within the broader felony and misdemeanor categories.
King County Executive Dow Constantine expressed opposition to the new standards, which he said fail to consider “the practical problems of adequate legislative funding from the state to fund the new caseloads and the daunting question of whether there are enough defense attorneys to staff the caseloads proposed by the CPD, as well as the increased numbers of judges, prosecutors, staff and infrastructure that would be necessary to maintain an operational criminal justice system.” Constantine is expected to release his 2025 budget proposal next week—an unusual one-year budget before the county returns to a normal biennial budget process next year.
“Matt Sanders has been appointed the Deputy Director and will serve as interim Director of DPD and provide stable leadership and continue to manage the department while a recruitment process takes place,” a spokesperson for Constantine said. “We have seven days to commence recruitment and we’re working on getting notifications” to the public defense advisory board—a group that, under county law, selects three candidates from which the county executive picks one to forward to the county council for an up or down approvalvote. “We have a code requirement for action within 60 days and we’re exploring options,” the spokesperson said.
“the focus has shifted to pursuing the lightest sentences” — I cannot fathom faulting a defense attorney for seeking a light sentence. Don’t lose sight of the defense attorney’s core role in the wave of peripheral holistic (and very much helpful) work.
Both Anita and Gordon are terrible leaders and treat their employees like garbage. Good Riddance!!
It is profoundly disheartening to see a leader assert that the entire system lacks compassion. As someone deeply committed to this work, I take immense pride in meeting clients where they are, fostering empathy, and extending genuine compassion.
Under the current leadership, the Department of Public Defense has taken an adversarial turn. Instead of supporting the client’s journey toward recovery, the focus has shifted to pursuing the lightest sentences. True support would involve addressing the underlying issues of mental health, addiction, and childhood trauma that bring clients into contact with the system in the first place.
DPD is focused on building a national reputation as progressive, prioritizing their image over the well-being of the individuals they claim to advocate for. Their emphasis is more on dismantling the system than on genuinely supporting those in need, reveling in their pursuit of recognition.
I often wonder how Khandelwal or her family would feel if they were victims of a DUI offender or someone struggling with mental illness who refuses treatment. Would their position change? Would they still advocate for leniency, or would they seek a more accountable approach?
Reflecting on the days when Gordon Hill was beginning his career and Theresa Allman was still with us, it’s clear that we had a collaborative culture. We worked alongside judges, probation officers, and various agencies, united in our mission to truly help our clients. We respected each other and functioned as comrades. I was there and I lived that reality.
I hope Gordon can recall those times and strive to cultivate a new environment where recidivism decreases because clients’ real needs are met.
Many public defenders repeatedly assert that their clients steal out of necessity, but this perspective is both misleading and disheartening. It overlooks the complex realities we face today. Many engage in criminal behavior not due to a lack of resources, but because they lack the necessary support to effect meaningful change. Furthermore, they are not held accountable in ways that encourage growth. I do not believe jail is the solution.
We need a transformative shift back to compassion and cooperation. It’s time to move away from a culture that has lost its way and allow the Department of Public Defense to reclaim its spirit of advocacy, collaboration, and genuine public service.
Very thoughtful comment, thank you for sharing this perspective.