For now, the lobby of North Dakota's newest public defender office is empty - chairs unoccupied, end tables not yet cluttered by magazines. But that likely will change this week when the office's attorneys start getting assignments to represent indigent defendants in 12 counties.

The office, located in the Ward Building on Bismarck's Rosser Avenue, opened in early July and will start taking cases this week.

The Bismarck location is the fifth public defender office to open in North Dakota as part of an overhaul of the state's indigent defense services. The office will represent defendants unable to pay for their own defense in the South Central District, which encompasses Burleigh, Emmons, Grant, Kidder, Logan, McIntosh, McLean, Mercer, Morton, Oliver, Sheridan and Sioux counties.

"This will be kind of the hub of the wheel," Robin Huseby, executive director of the North Dakota Commission on Legal Counsel for Indigents, said.

Cases will come into the office and be assigned to the attorneys in the office or private contract attorneys. Todd Schwarz, a Bismarck attorney, has been hired as the office's supervising attorney, and Travis Finck, formerly a defense attorney in Grand Forks, has been hired as a public defender. A third public defender position has yet to filled, Huseby said. Vickie Becker will work as an administrative assistant in the office, and a full-time legal assistant will be hired.

Defendants in North Dakota are considered indigent if they have an annual income below 125 percent of the poverty level and do not have the money to pay for an attorney. In 2008, a single person with no dependents must make less than $13,000 a year to qualify for a public defender, though other factors, such as extraordinary medical expenses, can come into play in determining whether someone is eligible for an appointed attorney.

"Let's say there were two people in the household, and they earned less than $17,500 annually," Huseby explained. "They would qualify."

Huseby said public defender offices were opened first in western parts of the state, because there were problems finding contract attorneys in those areas. The offices in Minot, Williston and Dickinson have been open since the spring of 2006.

In Dickinson, there weren't any contractors working for the state prior to the public defender office opening in March 2006, said Kevin McCabe, a public defender in Dickinson. Attorneys were assigned cases by judges as necessary, he said.

Things operate much more smoothly now, and clients are getting better services, he said.

"That's all we do is indigent defense work," McCabe said.

Grand Forks, Bismarck and Fargo also were identified as areas that could use public defender offices, though the need was not as great because those cities had competent contract attorneys available to take cases, she said.

"Those weren't as critical of areas," she said. "In Bismarck, we have very experienced contractors."

Grand Forks' public defender office opened in the summer of 2007. The commission plans to open the sixth office in Fargo in December, which will be the last one for the time being. Smaller offices in other parts of the state could be opened later if it appears there is a need, Huseby said.

About 2,400 indigent defense cases come into the South Central District annually, made up of adult criminal cases, juvenile criminal cases and some child support cases. The cases will be divided up among the public defenders and the contractors.

"Our goal is to have a combination system of public defenders in this office - three of them - and contractors," Huseby said.

In the South Central District office, some contractors will have specialties. Some attorneys have worked on juvenile cases and have expressed a desire to continue with that work, Huseby said. She said Kent Morrow, a Bismarck attorney, will handle less contract cases than is typical but will be assigned "more gnarly cases," such as murders.

The system has worked well so far in the offices in the western part of the state, Huseby said. Public defender offices provide stability, she said. For instance, if a contract attorney has an emergency or wants out of a contract, the commission has to scramble to find someone to take on the contractor's cases. The new attorney has to get up to speed on the cases, which can cause delays in the court system and cost the state money for the extra time.

If the same thing happens when a public defender office is in place, the attorneys in the office can take over the cases.

"We can take over and it's not such a crisis," Huseby said.

Another advantage of a public defender office is that the attorneys in the office can focus entirely on indigent defense, she said. They don't have to worry about overhead or private clients, and they have more opportunity to receive training.

Case management also is a big concern to the commission, Huseby said. She is working to develop a case management system where attorneys will electronically submit how long they work on cases so she can work to assign a manageable number of cases. Appointed attorneys often are stereotyped as overworked, uncaring and unknowledgeable, which shouldn't be the case, she said.

"These are all not true," she said, adding that big caseloads of 300 or 400 cases a year can contribute to those feelings. "You can hardly remember someone's name" with that big of a caseload.

Public defense systems that require attorneys to take on large case loads have been criticized in studies for giving attorneys an incentive to have defendants plead guilty to charges rather than take cases to trial.

While the new indigent defense system likely won't save the state money for the time being, it should be more cost-effective as time goes on, Huseby said, noting that the budget for indigent defense doubled with the changes. However, it should provide for better services to clients and the state, she said. Previously, North Dakota has been among the lowest in the nation in per capita funding for indigent defense services.

For the 2007-2009 biennium, the commission has $11,210,696 from the general fund, plus part of the money from court administration fees assessed to people convicted of crimes.

"We're really thrilled that the state has made the commitment to fund this program," Huseby said.

(Reach reporter Jenny Michael at 250-8225 or jenny.michael@bismarcktribune.com.)