Texas Fair Defense Project Prevails Over WilCo in Court

The Texas Supreme Court's Unauthorized Practice of Law Com­mit­tee has rejected a July 26, 2006, "secret" complaint filed by the Wil­liam­son County Attorney's Office against the Texas Fair Defense Project, a nonprofit legal advocacy group, according to TFDP attorney Harry Williams IV.

In June 2006, TFDP filed a class-action lawsuit alleging that the county systematically deprives indigent defendants of their constitutional right to court-appointed counsel, that it operates a closed-court system. In response, the county hit TFDP with an emergency motion for a temporary restraining order stating the group's "agents" were "causing judicial disruption" by "talking to defendants," though no such objections had been raised during a two-year observation period by TFDP. An affidavit by Sgt. Melissa Hightower of the William­son Co. Sheriff's Office showed that the county had cased TFDP personnel, including Adrian de la Rosa, going so far as to state, "Mr. De La Road [sic] attempted to make eye contact [with] defendants," and that an "unidentified male" went to the restroom while de la Rosa was talking to a defendant outside the courtroom. TFDP staff agreed to cease talking to defendants in the halls and apologized for leaving a brochure, but they denied any wrongdoing. Without explanation, the county abruptly aborted the motion, apparently opting for a cloak-and-dagger strategy instead, by filing the UPLC complaint.

The group has been kept in suspense about the particulars of the complaint ever since. At the time, Williams called it "Kafkaesque" – an allusion to The Trial, in which the protagonist is prosecuted for an unspecified crime – and said it was hard to counter as a result (see "WilCo, Texas Fair Defense Project Duke It Out," Feb. 2). In fact, TFDP first learned of the county's complaint in the Georgetown Sun. (The county refused to disclose the exact charges to the Chronicle on the grounds the complaint was part of ongoing litigation.) Only now that the case has been closed and TFDP has prevailed have they been able to obtain the complaint through an open-records request from UPLC.

The UPLC didn't buy the county's allegation that "hundreds of people are being victimized by TFDP each week." And now that Williams has seen the text of the complaint, he says that it illustrates "the upside-down world of Williamson Coun­ty, where it's wrong to inform people about their constitutional rights, but it's okay for the county to violate those rights."

The county had also filed a motion for dismissal of the lawsuit, challenging the trial court's jurisdiction to hear the case, which was denied on Oct. 4, 2006, by Judge Joseph Hart. On Jan. 29, 2007, the 3rd Court of Appeals took WilCo's appeal of the denial under advisement, where it remains. "We could settle today if the county would agree to abide by the law and respect defendants' rights, but the county clings to the idea that the Constitution does not apply in its courts," Williams said.

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*Oops! The following correction ran in the December 14, 2007 issue: In last week's "Texas Fair Defense Project Prevails Over WilCo in Court," Sgt. Melissa Hightower was incorrectly identified as working for the Williamson County Sheriff's Office. Instead, Hightower is a staff Investigator and peace officer for County Attorney Jana Duty's office.