Tag: Department of Public Defense

Courts, King County, Police

State Ruling Represents a Blow to Public Defense; Settlement In SPD Killing of 23-Year-Old Will Cost Taxpayers Millions

1. The state Public Employee Relations Commission ruled earlier this month that King County was not required to bargain with unionized staff for the county’s Department of Public Defense (DPD) before moving inmates from the King County jail in downtown Seattle to the South Correctional Entity (SCORE), a jail in Des Moines owned by several cities in South King County.

The decision to move people to SCORE, which the county argued was necessary to alleviate understaffing at the downtown jail, was controversial. Unionized staffers for the county’s Department of Public Defense, which represents indigent clients, argued that the move limited defendants’ access to attorneys and created logistical hurdles that made it harder for DPD to provide the best possible defense.

SEIU 925, the union that represents DPD employees, filed a demand to bargain over the proposal to move inmates to SCORE, arguing that the agreement creates changes to their members’ working conditions and was a mandatory subject of bargaining. A hearing examiner ruled in the union’s favor; PERC’s decision overturns that ruling.

The county’s contract with SCORE ended in 2023. But the PERC decision, which the union is appealing, has potentially serious implications for issues that remain ongoing, including caseloads and staffing levels at DPD and other local public defense agencies around the state attorneys and non-attorney DPD staff such as investigators, paralegals, and legal assistants.

According to public defense union president Molly Gilbert, “there has never been a decision like” the examiner’s initial ruling, which “would have required the county, and any other public defense office in that state, to negotiate with the union over caseloads and staffing.” In practice, Gilbert said, this could force the county to hire more staff, including paralegals and investigators, to lower caseloads make it easier for attorneys to handle the cases they have.

Public defender caseloads are an ongoing issue in Washington state; last year, the state Supreme Court ruled that jurisdictions like King County must reduce caseload standards dramatically over the next 10 years. According to Gilbert, a favorable outcome for the union wouldn’t necessarily result in a directive to hire dramatically more attorneys—a scenario that could set King County up for a consequential McLeary-style funding mandate to “lock in” complex caseload standards.

Instead, Gilbert said, the union has been making “proposals that are far cheaper than the bar standards that we could live with” by “having more staff support, which is cheaper than hiring all these attorneys. But they refuse to bargain with us on that.

The union is appealing PERC’s decision.

2. As PubliCola reported, the city settled with the family of Jaahnavi Kandula, a 23-year-old student killed in a crosswalk by a speeding Seattle police officer, earlier this month for a total of $29,011,000—$29 million plus $11,000, the amount a Seattle Police Officers Guild leader “joked” that the city would pay her family, given her “limited value.”  The comment, made by officer Daniel Auderer to SPOG president Mike Solan and caught on Auderer’s body camera, caused international outrage and led to Auderer’s termination.

SPD officer Kevin Dave was driving 74 miles an hour down a 25-mile-per-hour street when he struck Kandula, who was in a crosswalk; he claimed he was racing to provide medical care to an overdose victim who turned out to be a a guy concerned he had used too much cocaine.

After we published, a number of people asked PubliCola what Dave’s reckless driving would cost the city—and who would pay. We asked the Office of City Finance, and learned from a spokesperson that although the city’s insurance will cover $20 million of the settlement. The city itself is liable for the first $10 million of “any covered loss,” including lawsuit settlements. That $10 million deductible also includes the cost to defend SPD against the lawsuit filed by Kandula’s family.

That $10 million will come out of the city’s Judgment and Claims fund, which is part of the city’s general fund.

According to OCF, $20 million is the “full amount of available insurance and the insurers’ policy limits.” The city, in other words, is on the hook for its deductible plus any settlement amount above $20 million.

As we’ve reported repeatedly, the city has had to increase the judgment and claims fund routinely for several years running, thanks in large part to growing settlements in lawsuits against SPD. In addition to this ever-increasing line item, large settlements raise the amount the city pays for insurance; as of 2023, when Kandula was killed, the city was paying just under $9 million a year for insurance, the OCF spokesperson said. In short: SPD does not pay directly for any of the lawsuits it loses or settles.

Courts, King County

Public Defense Union Raises Concerns About Constantine’s Pick for DPD Director

By Erica C. Barnett

Earlier this month, as one of his final acts as King County Executive, Dow Constantine nominated Matt Sanders, the interim director of King County’s Department of Public Defense, as director of the agency, which has been without a permanent leaders since Anita Khandelwal resigned last September. In his announcement, Constantine called Sanders ” the ideal candidate to lead the Department of Public Defense in its important work” and praised his “leadership, advocacy, and unwavering commitment to both DPD employees and the people we serve.”

(The Sound Transit board voted to hire Constantine as Sound Transit CEO, at a starting salary of $450,000, on Thursday. The job comes with a monetary benefits package worth an additional $90,000 and will pay out one year’s salary when he leaves.)

Sanders was chosen over two other candidates, Snohomish County public defense department director Jason Schwartz and Morris Anyah, an administrative law judge at the Illinois Department of Employment Security.

A 12-person panel that interviewed the three applicants was made up mostly of management representatives, including several people who received promotions from Sanders and could lose their positions if the King County Council doesn’t choose him to lead the department. SEIU 925, the union that represents 371 DPD employees, including line attorneys and other staff, was allowed to have one attorney and one paralegal in the room.

PubliCola is supported entirely by readers like you.
CLICK BELOW to become a one-time or monthly contributor.

Support PubliCola

 

Rank and file union members have expressed concerns about Sanders, saying his management style has contributed to low morale and high turnover at the agency. DPD staff have struggled with high caseloads that, according to the union, still have not been resolved more than a year after the Washington State Bar Association adopted new caseload standards that would reduce the number of cases public defense attorneys have to but would also require departments to hire more staff. (Per a union communique in January: “Our Bargaining Team is juuuust about at its patience limit with this ‘collaborative process.’”)

On March 19, the union endorsed Schwartz over interim director Sanders, noting that as chair of the WSBA’s Council on Public Defense, he “was instrumental in drafting the new caseload standards” for public defense attorneys. “We are confident Jason would be an excellent leader during this time of transition,” the union wrote.

Two days later, Constantine announced he was appointing Sanders. The King County Council still has to approve the appointment, which will last one year; at that point, the next King County Executive will decide whether to reappoint Sanders to a full four-year term.

Attorneys who work in the King County court system say turnover at DPD is extraordinarily high, leading to a public defense department with fewer experienced attorneys. On the felony side, attorneys who are qualified to defend the most serious (Class A) felonies end up taking on cases from other attorneys when they leave, contributing to overwork and a lack of consistent representation for people who face the harshest penalties if convicted.

Two days after Constantine announced he was picking Sanders, SEIU delivered a petition demanding that he commit to “fully and faithfully implementing the caseload standards approved by the Washington State Bar Association within three years of July 1st, 2025” and that he reverse new caseload standards the department implemented last year, which, according to the union, are arbitrary and fail to limit caseloads to manageable levels..

“We, the employees of the Department of Public Defense, are feeling frustrated with your leadership,” the union wrote. “You have imposed policies that directly impact our working conditions without informing or consulting our union. We are not here to argue the details of specific policies. We have taken time away from our work—away from the clients that depend on us—to request that you display true leadership.”

In his response on March 27, Sanders wrote that DPD management “remains committed to ongoing improvements” in caseloads, but “will maintain the current status quo” until the union and management have finished bargaining over the new policy.

“[N]ot only am I committed to the implementation of the WSBA standards, but also I am embracing DPD’s place at the national forefront of implementation of these groundbreaking standards.”

The King County Council could approve Sanders’ appointment as early as next month.