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AGO backs removing PDO from the executive branch
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Posted on May 26 2005
The Attorney General’s Office favors the exclusion of the Public Defender’s Office from the executive branch of government, but said that the salary of the PDO’s head should not be commensurate to that of the attorney general.
Deputy attorney general Clyde Lemons Jr. submitted this position to Rep. Jesus S.N. Lizama, who chairs the House committee on Judiciary and Governmental Operations, in connection with House Bill 14-299, which seeks to give the CNMI public defender complete autonomy.
Citing the PDO’s setup in many jurisdictions, Lemons said the PDO should have oversight to which it should be answerable.
“The point is, in every jurisdiction, it has been well recognized that the public defender must have oversight and cannot be an autonomous agency. The AGO supports moving the PDO out of the executive branch and placing it within the judicial branch,” Lemons said.
But he added that the public defender’s salary should not be commensurate to that of the attorney general, noting the wide responsibility of the latter as chief legal officer of the Commonwealth.
Lemons also said that the attorney general is solely responsible for initiating and prosecuting all criminal and juvenile cases within the CNMI.
“The public defender’s primary responsibility is supervising five or six attorneys who are responsible for representing indigent defendants in criminal cases,” he said.
A feud has ensued between the AGO and the PDO regarding certain criminal cases, including those where the legitimacy of Pamela Brown as attorney general was questioned.
