Should have just offered Nichols mom $125,000$ and fried her son without any appeals being able to be used by him, saving the 2 million worthless dollars used so far. Sounds like a perfect plea deal to me in a perfect world.
ATLANTA --- The death-penalty trials of Troy Davis and Brian Nichols illustrate the tug-of-war over public defender funding.
Mr. Davis was less than 24 hours away from his execution when the Georgia Supreme Court decided to hear whether he deserves a new trial after seven of the nine witnesses at his original trial changed their stories about the killing of a Savannah policeman in 1989.
His defenders say Mr. Davis was convicted in part because there wasn't enough money for his public defender to interview the witnesses adequately or to hire an investigator to look into their claims of police intimidation.
Mr. Nichols' defense team has spent close to $2 million even before his trial for allegedly killing a judge, court reporter, sheriff's deputy and federal customs agent while escaping custody at the Fulton County Courthouse.
Legislators often point to Mr. Nichols' case when they argue for changing the state's system for funding public defenders. Those on the other side point to Mr. Davis' case as an example of too little money.
The debate reached a milestone last week with the release of a report by a joint House-Senate committee of Republicans that criticized the Georgia Public Defenders Standards Council for mismanagement and pushing an agenda opposed to the death penalty.
The report notes that hiring private attorneys, as in Mr. Nichols' case, is far more expensive than using staff lawyers. For a typical case, an outside attorney costs taxpayers roughly $1,000, compared to $174 for an in-house lawyer, according to the report.
It recommends using staff attorneys from neighboring counties rather than private lawyers.
NEW JUDGE
ATLANTA --- A judge from a suburban county has been appointed to preside over the murder trial of accused courthouse shooter Brian Nichols.
Cobb County Superior Court Judge James Bodiford was assigned by an administrative judge to oversee the Nichols case, Fulton County Superior Court spokesman Don Plummer said.
Judge Bodiford replaces Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller, who stepped down from the case last week.
-- Associated Press
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