Public Defender hero
Ernie Lewis is a PD's PD. He's built a statewide program in Kentucky that's a model for the rest of the country, he's an outstanding lawyer, manager, trainer, and miracle worker, and he does it all while being one of the most courtly and least self-impressed people who you're ever likely to meet in the law.
Lewis has been with the Department of Public Advocacy since he graduated from law school in 1977. This month he was re-appointed by the governor for a third term as Public Advocate for the Commonwealth of Kentucky. In 1996, when he was first sworn in, Lewis said, "I ask you to judge me by the vision of the right to counsel." Eight years later, you can see for yourself how the vision's been met, at several DPA webpages.
1 Comment:
Hey, Skelly ...
It's alias, again.
I posted a rather lengthy response to your hero worship on that later post of yours (8.30.04), where you logroll back to Lewis' paid flack for his link to this blawg of yours. (Didn't Spy magazine have a monthly section called "Logrolling in our Times", all about how you can trace the blurbs on the dust jackets of rarely viewed tomes back to authors who constantly praise each other's works on each others dust jackets?) The Comment there on your Blawg entry for 8.30.04 has the quotes from one of our more prestigious panels of our intermediary appellate courts here in Kentucky, reaming out Lewis for throwing yet another sacrificial lamb into the maw of unmanageable caseloads.
I'm posting this note here just to make sure that any of the 300+ Legal Workers in this statewide public defender system here in Kentucky won't miss the Comment about their warrior-leader-hero. You can bet they didn't miss the link to your Blawg that designated as a hero this aging, sell-out numbers-cruncher, who hasn't tried a case in 20 years. He had his Official Biographer (oops, his "Training and Education Director") make sure that the link that called him a hero was sent out on the State List Serv to all of his employees.
So any of you Kentucky serfs in the OPA that track back to the Blawg that calls this Governor's Hatchet Man a Hero, make sure you go on to read Skelly's post on 8.30.04, and particularly read the Comment there. You better follow it up. The Comment there quotes the Court of Appeals in its discussion of what a poor job your Managers are doing. And there's a lesson for us fellow-apprenticed workers ... we're next, if it advances Lewis' hold on his duchy. Anon. PS ... don't forget to note that when the Court of Appeals ordered Lewis to appear with Stutsman to answer whether, in fact, caseloads have gotten so far out of hand that it's nigh impossible to meet the appellate deadlines, Lewis tried to hide from it, asking to be allowed to send a 'designee'. (Query: is this the same thing as the discredited historical Civil War practice of buying someone to answer your Draft call?) The Court refused, and made Lewis appear. Anybody up for a transcript of what Lewis and your other Bosses said? Anon.
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