Trumbull commissioners switch to court appointed system July 1 for common pleas court

Staff report

WARREN

The Ohio Public Defender’s office and its Trumbull County attorneys will no longer provide criminal defense to low-income people facing felony charges in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court starting July 1.

The office will continue to provide representation to low-income defendants in the county’s municipal courts.

The contract the Trumbull County commissioners approved Friday with the Ohio Public Defender’s office removes their responsibilities at the common pleas courts and pays the office less money – $416,164 for the year starting July 1, compared with $920,000 this year.

Starting July 1, the common pleas court judges will appoint attorneys from a list being put together, common pleas court Judge W. Wyatt McKay said.

The common pleas court previously used an appointed system until about the 1980s, when the Ohio Public Defender’s office offered to represent defendants in cases involving the death penalty, the judge said.

But sometime in the past year, the judges learned the Ohio Public Defender’s office would no longer provide that type of defense, so that may have taken away a reason for continuing with the Public Defender’s office, the judge said.

Trumbull County Commissioner Mauro Cantalamessa said the common pleas judges encouraged the commissioners to switch from the public defender’s to an appointed system, but he would not discuss specific reasons why.

When Cantalamessa was told of an internal investigation regarding two top employees of the Trumbull County branch of the Ohio Public Defender’s office that found fault with the employees, he said he was unaware of it and said that was not a reason for eliminating the Public Defender’s office at common pleas.

Elizabeth Miller, assistant director of the Ohio Public Defender’s office, said all of the office’s three full-time attorneys, three support people and two investigators will be retained. The three full-time attorneys will work in the municipal courts, she said. She also does not expect the attorneys who work under a contract to be affected, she said.