The San Francisco Public Defender's Office is an agency of the
Government of San Francisco
The government of the City and County of San Francisco utilizes the " strong mayor" form of mayoral/council government, composed of the Mayor, Board of Supervisors, several elected officers, and numerous other entities. It is the only consolida ...
. Since 1921, it has provided
legal assistance
Legal aid is the provision of assistance to people who are unable to afford legal representation and access to the court system. Legal aid is regarded as central in providing access to justice by ensuring equality before the law, the right to co ...
to indigent individuals charged with violations of
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
state law State law refers to the law of a federated state, as distinguished from the law of the federation of which it is a part. It is used when the constituent components of a federation are themselves called states. Federations made up of provinces, cant ...
by the
San Francisco District Attorney's Office
The San Francisco District Attorney's Office is the legal agency charged with prosecuting crimes in the City and County of San Francisco, California.
The current district attorney is Brooke Jenkins. Occupants of this office have gone on to highe ...
.
Courts within its jurisdiction include the
San Francisco Superior Court
The Superior Court of California of the County of San Francisco is the Superior Courts of California, state superior court with jurisdiction over the San Francisco, City and County of San Francisco.
History
In 1976 the Court helped to create the ...
, the
California Court of Appeal
The California Courts of Appeal are the state intermediate appellate courts in the U.S. state of California. The state is geographically divided along county lines into six appellate districts. for the
Fourth District, and the
California Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of California is the highest and final court of appeals in the courts of the U.S. state of California. It is headquartered in San Francisco at the Earl Warren Building, but it regularly holds sessions in Los Angeles and Sacra ...
. The current Public Defender of San Francisco is
Manohar Raju
Manohar Raju is an American attorney who has served as San Francisco Public Defender's Office, Public Defender of San Francisco since 2019. Appointed by Mayor London Breed to replace the late Jeff Adachi, Raju previously served as Deputy Public D ...
, who was appointed to the position in 2019.
History
The Public Defender's office was founded in 1921 with only one attorney, former police officer Frank Egan, and no support staff. Over the course of Egan's tenure, the office grew to over a dozen attorneys and a few support staff. In 1932, Frank Egan was arrested for the murder of a close friend and former client whose financial affairs he had managed. He was ultimately convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.
Following Egan's arrest, Gerald J. Kenny was appointed Public Defender in 1932 and subsequently elected. Under the City Charter, San Francisco became the first and only city in the state to elect its Public Defender by popular vote. Kenny served for two decades, until his death in 1954. Kenny was a pioneer in the office's long tradition of helping former prisoners turn their lives around.
Edward Mancuso was appointed in 1954 to complete Kenney's term, and he served until his retirement in 1974. Under Mancuso, the office began representing indigent people accused of misdemeanors as well as those accused of felonies. In 1965, Mancuso appointed the office's first African-American female attorney, Estella Dooley, who later established the Mental Health unit of the office.
In 1974, Robert Nicco was appointed Public Defender and subsequently elected, after having served as Chief Attorney under Mancuso. Under Nicco, Fred Smith served as the office's first African-American Chief Attorney from 1974-1979, and the office hired Manoucher Farzan, who was the first Persian-American attorney in the United States.
In 1978,
Geoffrey F. Brown
Geoffrey Francis Brown (born May 20, 1943), known as Jeff Brown, is an American attorney and retired government official. From 2001 to 2007, Brown served as a member of the California Public Utilities Commission.
Early life and education
Brown ...
was elected Public Defender of San Francisco and was re-elected five times. Brown worked to increase staffing to handle the office's growing caseload, which had grown to 20,000 clients each year. During Brown's tenure, the Public Defender's Office grew to a staff of 83 attorneys and 40 support personnel.
Jeff Adachi
Jeffrey Gordon Adachi (August 29, 1959 – February 22, 2019) was an American attorney, pension reform advocate, and politician who served as the Public Defender of San Francisco from 2003 to 2019.
Early life and education
Adachi was the ...
was elected San Francisco Public Defender in November 2002 and held office from January 2003 until his death in February 2019. In February 2011, Adachi appointed
Matt Gonzalez
Matthew Edward Gonzalez (born June 4, 1965) is an American politician, lawyer, and activist. He served on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from 2001 and 2005 and was president of the Board. In 2003, Gonzalez, running as a member of the Gre ...
chief attorney in the Public Defender's Office.
As of 2012, the San Francisco Public Defender's Office is one of the most diverse law offices in the country, with over 55% women and 50% minorities and LGBT attorneys and staff.
In 2016, the office became involved in the
Frisco Five The Frisco Five, also known as #Frisco5, are a group of protesters who went on hunger strike on April 21, 2016 in San Francisco, California in front of the San Francisco Police Department Mission Station to demonstrate against episodes of police br ...
protest. The San Francisco Public Defender
Jeff Adachi
Jeffrey Gordon Adachi (August 29, 1959 – February 22, 2019) was an American attorney, pension reform advocate, and politician who served as the Public Defender of San Francisco from 2003 to 2019.
Early life and education
Adachi was the ...
sent California Attorney General
Kamala Harris
Kamala Devi Harris ( ; born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who is the 49th vice president of the United States. She is the first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, as well ...
a request that supported the protestor's claims of racism by the San Francisco Police Department,
and requested a civil rights investigation that would be enforceable.
After Gongora's death, Adachi was joined by District Attorney George Gascon, Mission District Supervisor David Campos, and other stakeholders to protest the lack of transparency and need for police reform.
Following Adachi's death,
Manohar Raju
Manohar Raju is an American attorney who has served as San Francisco Public Defender's Office, Public Defender of San Francisco since 2019. Appointed by Mayor London Breed to replace the late Jeff Adachi, Raju previously served as Deputy Public D ...
was chosen to appointed him in 2019, and was formally elected to the position in November 2019. Raju is the only elected public defender in California and runs an office of more than 100 attorneys and 60 staff members, which has a $24 million budget and serves 23,000 clients each year.
Henry Hotel scandal
In March 2011, Adachi released surveillance tape gathered by public defender investigators showing plainclothes narcotics officers from the San Francisco Police Department entering rooms in the Henry Hotel and conducting warrantless searches of rooms and people, taking property from residents, and roughing up citizens. Corresponding police reports and testimony in resulting cases did not correspond with evidence shown on surveillance, leading Adachi to accuse the officers of perjury.
Adachi further revealed evidence that owners of single resident occupancy hotels had been bullied by police into handing over master keys to tenant room
Over the next several months, the public defender's office released similar video from several other hotels, implicating officers from the Mission and Southern station and prompting the FBI to launch an investigation. In February, 2014, five veteran San Francisco police officers and a former officer were indicted on federal corruption charges connected to the misconduct first revealed by public defenders.
Programs
Clean Slate
In 1999, the San Francisco Public Defender's office launched a Clean Slate program to expunge the criminal records of people whose old convictions had become obstacles to obtaining work, housing, and educational opportunities.
Immigration Unit
In May, 2017, in response to expanded federal immigration enforcement priorities and increased arrests, the office launched its Immigration Unit, an innovative legal team that aids immigrant detainees.
LEAP
The Legal Educational Advocacy Program (LEAP) assigning an attorney trained in education law to serve families of youth represented by public defenders in criminal cases. The program, which also includes social workers, helps court involved youth stay in school by ensuring access to special education services through the public school system. It also provides legal representation at families during public school disciplinary hearings. The program received a 2014 Managerial Excellence Award from civic planning organization
San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association, SPUR.
Bail Reform Advocacy
The office has been at the front of bail reform efforts in California, filing lawsuits on behalf of its clients and challenging bail in nearly every case. The appeal on behalf of client Kenneth Humphrey led to the revolutionary “Humphrey decision” which held that judges must hold a hearing to consider how a defendant's financial circumstances affect the ability to pay bail and also consider non-monetary alternatives when setting bail.
Pretrial Release Unit
In October, 2017, the office launched its Pretrial Release Unit, which aims to reduce wealth disparities in pre-arraignment representation and unnecessary pre-trial incarceration by providing legal advice and advocacy to indigent arrestees. The program likewise aims to reduce the county jail population by increasing arrestees’ likelihood of pretrial release A study from the California Policy Lab at University of California Berkeley found that the program saved $806,508 in taxpayer money and thousands of jail beds during its first five months of operation.
Films
The office was featured in the 2002
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...
documentary ''Presumed Guilty'', a film about the San Francisco Public Defender's office, its difficult cases and complex defense strategies.
Another film, the 2017 independent documentary ''Defender'', was named the 2017 Best Documentary at
ITVFest (Independent Television Festival)
Catalyst Story Institute & Content Festival, formerly the ITVFest (The Independent Television Festival), is an arts organization and an annual festival gathering of fans, artists and executives from around the world to celebrate outstanding indepen ...
.
Notable defenders
*
Manohar Raju
Manohar Raju is an American attorney who has served as San Francisco Public Defender's Office, Public Defender of San Francisco since 2019. Appointed by Mayor London Breed to replace the late Jeff Adachi, Raju previously served as Deputy Public D ...
*
Jeff Adachi
Jeffrey Gordon Adachi (August 29, 1959 – February 22, 2019) was an American attorney, pension reform advocate, and politician who served as the Public Defender of San Francisco from 2003 to 2019.
Early life and education
Adachi was the ...
*
Robert Amparan
Robert Marlowe Amparan is an American criminal defense attorney currently based in San Francisco, California. He became notable for successfully defending former JonBenét Ramsey murder suspect John Mark Karr, along with attorneys Gayle Gutekun ...
*
Chesa Boudin
*
Kimiko Burton
Kimiko Burton, formerly Kimiko Burton-Cruz, is an American attorney and government official.
Burton is serving a second term as a member of the California State Personnel Board after having been reappointed by Governor Gavin Newsom in 2019. From ...
*
Jami Floyd
Jami Floyd (born September 10, 1964) is an American attorney, journalist, network news anchor, legal and political analyst, and former White House Fellow. She is the former Legal Analyst at Al Jazeera America and the former Legal Editor and hos ...
*
Matt Gonzalez
Matthew Edward Gonzalez (born June 4, 1965) is an American politician, lawyer, and activist. He served on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from 2001 and 2005 and was president of the Board. In 2003, Gonzalez, running as a member of the Gre ...
*
Mike Guingona
Michael P. Guingona (born 1962), also known as Mike Guingona, is an American politician of Filipino descent who served as a Councilmember for the city of Daly City, California from 1993 to 2018, including several terms as Mayor. He is an attorne ...
*
Gerardo Sandoval
Gerardo Compos Sandoval (born 1962) is a judge of the Superior Court of California in and for the County of San Francisco. He was formerly a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. A practicing attorney, he defeated Superior Court j ...
References
External links
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Lawyers from San Francisco
Government of San Francisco
Legal aid in the United States
Criminal defense organizations
1921 establishments in California
Public defense institutions