Butte County needs a public defender’s office | Editor For A Day

Butte County needs a public defender’s office | Editor For A Day

In 1961, Clarence Gideon—tried before a jury without a lawyer — was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison. In a handwritten petition to the United States Supreme Court, he argued that he should have been provided counsel despite having no money. The Court agreed. With an attorney at his retrial, he was found not guilty, and from that point forward, anyone facing imprisonment became entitled to legal representation. In 1986, I went to w…