A federal appeals court has declined to reconsider its earlier decision limiting the ability of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to lodge legal challenges to their confinement.

In analysis for SCOTUSblog, Lyle Denniston writes that the Jan. 5 decision by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia "upheld a wide-ranging view of the government's authority to detain non-citizens suspected of terrorism, ruling that the power is not limited in any way by international law - a view that even the Obama Administration indicated it did not share."

Denniston, however, notes that the federal appeals court's action today in Al Bihani v. Obama produced lengthy statements by several of the circuit's judges "to narrow the scope of" the initial panel decision, which upheld the imprisonment of Al Bihani, a former cook for the Taliban who maintains that he never engaged in combat against U.S. forces. The federal appeals court denial of rehearing and the judge's statements are available here (pdf).

A bipartisan group of former senior Department of Justice attorneys and other federal prosecutors recently lodged an amicus brief with the Supreme Court urging it to leave intact a Louisiana jury verdict against prosecutors who withheld evidence in a case that produced a murder conviction. The unique collaboration of the DOJ and federal prosecutors maintains in its friend-of-the-court brief filed in Connick v. Thompson that prosecutors should be responsible for ensuring that constitutional rights are not subverted in the process of securing convictions. The Supreme Court will hear oral argument in Connick early in its forthcoming term, which starts on Oct. 4. 

In the Connick case, a jury awarded John Thompson $14 million, in part, because prosecutors withheld evidence to help secure his murder conviction. Thompson spent 18 years in prison and had come close to being executed before he was acquitted in a retrail. Following his acquittal, Thompson sued Harry F. Connick, who led the district attorney's office at the time Thompson was convicted in 1985. (Connick is the father Harry Connick Jr., the Grammy-award winning singer.) The New Orleans district attorney's office has fought the jury award, arguing that it should not be liable for the actions of prosecutors in the case. As The Associated Press noted, the Supreme Court has "approved only narrow instances in which local government agencies can be sued for wrongdoing of their rank-and-file employees."

Thompson's attorneys have argued that prosecutors violated his rights pursuant to federal law, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, which requires prosecutors to discharge their duties in a manner that does not violate constitutional rights. In Supreme Court precedent regarding Sec. 1983, such as Brady v. Maryland, the high court held that withholding evidence is a violation of prosecutors' obligations. Thompson's legal action maintained that the New Orleans district attorney's office violated the federal law because it failed to train its prosecutors on avoiding Brady violations.

The coalition of former DOJ attorneys, in its amicus brief, states that its "interest is in ensuring that Section 1983 realizes its promise as a remedy for conduct that causes constitutional violations and that the balance of interests carefully struck by this Court's precedents is preserved. The Court's precedent with respect to section 1983 failure-to-train claims promotes respect for the rule of law by holding municipal entities to account when they demonstrate deliberate indifference to constitutional rights and cause constitutional violations. Although successful failure-to-train claims are, and should be, rare, their continued availability strengthens public respect for the criminal justice system, particularly against criticism that the system is indifferent (if not hostile) to the rights of those charged, especially those wrongly charged, with criminal acts."

The coalition includes former Assistant Attorneys General and Acting Assistant Attorneys General Bill Lann Lee and William Yeomans, both ACS participants. Counsel for the coalition of attorneys includes former Solicitor General Paul D. Clement, who served during the administration of President George W. Bush, and Stanford law school professor and ACS Board member Pamela S. Karlan. See the entire amicus brief here.

Oral argument in Connick v. Thompson is scheduled for Wednesday, Oct. 6, 2010.

 

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By James M. Doyle, a lawyer with Carney & Bassil and former head of the Public Defender Division of the Massachusetts Committee for Public Counsel Services, a statewide public defender agency. Doyle is the author of a recent ACS Issue Brief, "From Error Toward Quality: A Federal Role in Support of Criminal Process."

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Why not a comprehensive, blue ribbon, top-to-bottom review of the American criminal justice system?

The fact is, no one can think of an objection, and legislation submitted by Sen. Jim Webb and Rep. William Delahunt that would create a National Criminal Justice Commission to conduct that review has support from all points on the criminal justice spectrum and co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle. The odds favor eventual passage, and that's an excellent development. Any review that takes a grown-up look at the American criminal justice system as a system rather than as an archipelago of isolated (and often adversarial) agencies and functions is a step in the right direction. (For more on this, watch video of an ACS panel on an integrative approach to justice.) Blue ribbon commissions draw talented members who deploy broad credibility in support of their recommendations.

But if the only thing this top-to-bottom review leaves behind is another report -- even if it's a great report with terrific recommendations -- it will not realize its full potential. The Commission's report can be the beginning of a process, not the end of one. It can reveal something for the best people in criminal justice to do between today and the inevitable next National Commission.

So far, criminal justice is missing the infrastructure for an enduring, bottom-to-top feedback loop, one that persistently communicates the experiences and insights of the victims, cops, lawyers, judges, and probation and corrections officials at the sharp end of the system both to fellow practitioners in scattered jurisdictions and to remote policy-makers: the legislators, and funders whose decisions shape (and often deform) the practitioners' working lives.

In a recently released issue brief, "From Error Toward Quality: A Federal Role in Support of Criminal Process," I propose that the criminal justice system develop a mechanism, as medicine and aviation have, to create this loop by identifying "sentinel events"-- wrongful convictions, wrongful releases, and near misses in both categories -- that help us avoid future errors and to analyze and share their lessons. Supporting the ongoing practice of dispassionate, fine-grained, all-stakeholders review of these mistakes could provide a revolutionary new approach to creating a reliable system.

The adversarial trial before a citizen jury dramatizes the relationship between an American and the state, and its hold on our imaginations overshadows the fact that the adversarial contest functions as the final inspection stage of a long and complicated process. But in every industry, end-stage inspection has been shown to be a very problematic means of quality control because everyone hates to be inspected. That may be why the jury trial inspection hardly ever happens: mandatory minimums are enacted; plea leverage is ratcheted up; the number of actual jury trials sinks to the vanishing point. The endemic human tendency to "game" any looming inspection also takes a toll. Ongoing controversy over law enforcement failures to preserve or disclose exculpatory evidence illustrates this tendency to influence the inspectors' view of things by simplifying the picture that the inspector is allowed to review. When Missouri's prosecutors come out for eliminating the state-wide public defender system, human discomfort with inspection is part of the reason.

A striking element of the American criminal justice system is its lack of any mechanism for routinely taking account of the causes of error. Searches for bad apples occur from time to time: civil suits are sometimes filed, internal affairs investigations are performed, the media pillory is sometimes occupied by a corrupt or incompetent practitioner, but these vehicles only drive accounts of other errors underground, and inspire frantic efforts to evade or deflect blame for them in place of efforts to learn from them. Besides, these disciplinary and punitive inspections misdiagnose the nature of error, which as aviation, medicine, and a host of other fields have proved are not the sinister work of bad apples acting alone but the result of small mistakes (that are necessary but not sufficient) interacting with each other and with latent defects in the system -- latent defects that will still be there -- waiting for the next mistake that comes along. A wrongful conviction or a wrongful release happens because an imperfect system has failed to take adequate account of the fallibility of its human components. We have to take account of both individual errors and system weaknesses.

Medicine and other fields have successfully mobilized "all-stakeholders" teams to analyze and report on known errors and near misses. The factual reports these efforts have generated have been illuminating, but more importantly, the practice of compiling system-oriented reports has been the starting place for mobilizing a continuous quality improvement movement that, among other achievements, has developed practices that saved 120,000 patients' lives in 12 months. The range of mistakes and "near misses" that frontline practitioners might nominate for review is very broad, and it is not limited to mistaken outcomes; it can include astronomical costs. ("How in Hell did we spend $75,000 on a simple drug possession case? And why?").

The practitioners at the sharp end of the system take the blame for mistakes, and often they deserve a share of it. But they don't deserve all of the blame, and sometimes blame is beside the point. If the National Commission on Criminal Justice -- from its perch far off at the blunt end of the system -- wants to promote an active effort to avoid the next mistake or to mitigate its effect it has to mobilize those practitioners and make sure their efforts to improve system reliability are not heroic exceptions, but can be part of everyday routine -- and that they are heard when the next Commission comes around.

The U.S. government has lost eight out of 15 habeas petition cases in which Guantánamo inmates alleged they or witnesses against them were forcibly interrogated, reports ProPublica, in an analysis jointly published with The National Law Journal.

The report by the investigative journalism nonprofit assesses the effect of mistreatment allegations on detainees' lawsuits by looking at 31 published decisions, which resolve the claims of 52 captives who alleged they were wrongfully detained. Fifteen of those published decisions were found to contain allegations of mistreatment, ranging from verbal threats to physical abuse labeled as torture, but because large portions of some of the decisions were redacted, the report notes that there may be other cases in which inmates alleged forcible interrogation.

The judges in these cases rejected government evidence that had been coercively obtained, using forcible interrogations. "Even in the seven cases the government won, the judges didn't endorse aggressive methods," ProPublica reports, noting that in six of those cases, the judge disbelieved the detainees' allegations of mistreatment.

The report continues:

The 15 decisions offer the most detailed accounting to date of how information obtained from the Guantánamo inmates through controversial tactics is standing up in court. They come in cases initiated by detainees seeking release via a writ of habeas corpus, not cherry-picked by prosecutors. Criminal law experts say the judges' opinions help explain why the government has decided not to pursue criminal convictions against some detainees. Such evidence would pose even greater problems in criminal trials, for which requirements of proof are more demanding.

The Obama administration has already said that at least 48 of the remaining 176 prisoners at Guantánamo will be held indefinitely because they're too dangerous to release but can't be prosecuted successfully in military or civilian court. They've said that coercion-tainted evidence is one obstacle.

The report also notes that the government was successful in only one out of fifteen cases in arguing that the taint of government coercion was eliminated by a subsequent change in location, interrogator or circumstance.

In all, 53 habeas cases have been decided, of which the government has lost 37, "most because it couldn't produce enough reliable evidence that the men were al-Qaida or Taliban militants," according to the report. More than 50 habeas suits are still pending.

The report includes two in-depth charts, one documenting "How Judges are Ruling in Cases Where Mistreatment is an Issue" and one containing updated information on all detainees whose lawsuits have been decided by federal judges.

U.S. attorney positions in Texas remain unfilled, writes Todd J. Gillman of The Dallas Morning News (DMN). The DMN notes that the "Senate has confirmed Obama-picked prosecutors for 57 or 93 federal districts nationwide. Nineteen more nominations are pending. A dozen districts have no nominee, including the four in Texas."

The DMN reports:

Tussles between Texas' senators, both Republican, and the state's Democrats in the U.S. House certainly caused some of the delay, but both sides long ago submitted lists of preferred nominees that largely overlap. While most states have gotten Obama nominees, Texas is still waiting.

...

With Democrats expected to lose Senate seats in November, winning confirmation of nominees won't get any easier. And the longer Obama waits, the harder it gets to woo top talent because of the grueling process, said Paul Coggins, the U.S. attorney in Dallas under [President] Clinton.

Coggins added, "At some point the White House just has to step in and say, ‘Look I've heard from the senators, and I've heard from the congressman, and here's who I'm nominating.' You'll probably hack off one side or the other but that certainly would be welcome among most of us Texans."

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By Nkechi Taifa, Senior Policy Analyst at The Open Society Policy Center and the author of an ACS Issue Brief, "The 'Crack/Powder' Disparity: Can the International Race Convention Provide a Basis for Relief?"

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For nearly a quarter of a century the disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentencing has stood out as one of the most notorious illustrations of unfairness in the criminal justice system. Since 1986 low-level crack cocaine offenders selling sugar packet and candy-bar-weight quantities of crack cocaine have been punished far more severely than their counterparts who trafficked in large-scale quantities of powder cocaine. For example, one who possessed just 5 grams of crack cocaine received a mandatory felony sentence of at least five years without parole in federal prison, yet one selling 100 times that amount of powder cocaine -- 500 grams -- received the same five-year sentence. Far from being "tough on crime," this 100:1 quantity ratio of low level crack prosecutions amounted to what has been described as "junk food justice," primarily impacting African Americans at the bottom rung of the drug chain.

As a result of bipartisan legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by President Obama on August 3, the five-year sentence for simple possession of crack cocaine has been eliminated. This represents the first time in 40 years that a federal mandatory minimum sentence has been repealed, making the Fair Sentencing Act (S. 1789) a historic legislative achievement. Although advocates fought long and hard for the complete elimination of disparate treatment in crack cocaine sentencing, the Act significantly lowered the 100:1 ratio for distribution of crack to 18:1. While not ideal, achieving this reduction with agreement across the political spectrum was extraordinary, particularly with mid-term elections looming. The new 18:1 ratio will bring relief to nearly 3,000 cases a year, reduce crack sentences by nearly 30 months and, according to the Congressional Budget Office, save the federal government $42 million dollars over a five year period.

Rare bipartisan consensus in support of drug sentencing reform was the catalyst in the passage of the Fair Sentencing Act. Widespread agreement from not only civil rights and criminal justice groups that have historically worked on the issue, but also support from the White House and Justice Department, law enforcement and prosecutors, and political and religious conservatives, was influential. Partisan politics was tabled as Senators and Representatives from both sides of the aisle spoke to the critical need for reform. Rather than the political posturing of "tougher than thou" on crime, the overriding sentiment became "smarter on crime." A groundswell of bipartisan support culminated in "cracking" the disparity, and now it is critical that these same champions come together to support continued reform.

Despite significant improvements made by the Fair Sentencing Act, its application is not retroactive and, absent intervention, those currently incarcerated pursuant to the previous, flawed sentencing scheme will receive no relief. It is incumbent that a bipartisan body of conservatives and progressives, inclusive of sentencing experts, law enforcement professionals, academicians and advocates formally come together to brainstorm relief mechanisms that the U.S. Sentencing Commission, Congress, the Department of Justice, and the President can take to ensure that the fairer sentences that are now the law of the land apply retroactively as well.

For example, the President has the unique power to correct historical injustices through the presidential pardon powder. Hamedah Hasan, a grandmother serving the 17th of a 27-year federal prison sentence for a non-violent crime involving crack cocaine, filed a commutation petition to President Obama earlier this year, after exhausting all other legal remedies. Hasan unquestionably deserves relief. However, rather than the proliferation of individual petitions such as Hasan's, creative recommendations can be advanced such as blanket commutations that extend across the class of incarcerated people currently imprisoned under a law now established as unjust.

Just as there was strong bipartisan energy for the passage of crack cocaine reform legislation, there must likewise be similar vigor to extend the law's reach to others equally deserving - whether through the presidential pardon power, Sentencing Commission guidelines adjustment, or congressional passage of retroactive legislation. And, importantly, the struggle must continue for the complete elimination of the disparity as we strive towards full fairness and confidence in federal drug sentencing policy.

In a just-released ACS Issue Brief, Professor Stephen I. Vladeck (pictured right) looks to one high-profile terrorism case as an "an unvarnished example" of how the federal court system can adeptly handle trying terrorism suspects, providing new evidence in the ongoing debate on whether terrorism cases should be tried by civilian courts or military tribunals.

The case of Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, a U.S. citizen convicted of conspiring with al Qaeda to kill President George W. Bush, raised new and hard questions, Vladeck writes in "Trying Terrorism Suspects in Article III Courts: The Lessons of United States v. Abu Ali," but they were questions the civilian criminal justice system is well-equipped to answer.

"[W]here unique national security concerns are implicated, Abu Ali suggests that courts will attempt to reach accommodations that take into account both the government's interest and the fundamental protections to which defendants are entitled, keeping in mind Justice Frankfurter's age-old admonition that ‘the safeguards of liberty have frequently been forced in controversies involving not very nice people,' " writes Vladeck (pictured right), a law professor at American University Washington College of Law.

Abu Ali's case presented the novel question of whether a defendant's Miranda rights were triggered where U.S. officials submitted questions to foreign officers for their use during interrogation. This question, Vladick points out, is not one that applies only in terrorism cases and the court's conclusion that the United States and Saudi Arabia were not engaged in a "joint venture" is applicable to other criminal procedure fact patterns.

Abu Ali also presented the new challenge of incorporating foreign depositions in a U.S. court proceeding. Judge Gerald Bruce Lee used "creativity and flexibility" to craft a method for performing a live, two-way video deposition that transmitted the proceedings to the Alexandria courtroom, during which defense lawyers were present in both Saudi Arabia and Alexandria, Vladeck writes. Lee's innovation showed how technology can help cabin proposed changes to current procedural rules, by adapting within the present framework, Vladeck adds.

Lastly, Abu Ali presented the controversial question of whether the court erred when it allowed the jury access to classified information, while the defendant had access only to a redacted version. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit agreed that this "silent witness" procedure was a violation of Abu Ali's right to confront witnesses against him, but it also concluded that the decision was harmless error.

"[T]he real lesson from this aspect of the Abu Ali litigation may just be that mistakes will be made, but the Supreme Court's increasing embrace of harmless error principles heavily mitigates the consequences of those mistakes," Vladeck writes.

Regardless of whether it was misapplied, the harmless error doctrine, like other aspects of the case, "does not turn on the centrality of terrorism and national security concerns in the litigation," he adds.

"Abu Ali reminds us," Vladeck concludes, "that sometimes, the law is set up properly to resolve the tension between the government's interests and the defendant's rights, even if reasonable minds could argue (in this area of law, as in any other) that judges sometimes get it wrong."

Vladeck's Issue Brief is available here.

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Pat Nolan is Vice President of Prison Fellowship, an outreach program to prisoners and their families, and leads the ministry's criminal justice reform arm, Justice Fellowship. For more information about drug policy reform, go to Justice Fellowship's Drug Policy Key Issue Page. 

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In an important victory for justice, President Obama today signed the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, putting an end to the 100-to-1 disparity between punishments for crack cocaine and powder cocaine.

The passage of the bill was a pivotal point in the fight to correct imbalances in our sentencing laws. The bill repeals a mandatory minimum sentence for the first time since mandatory minimums were introduced in the Nixon administration. It is important to note that this law had the support of Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle who joined forces in a remarkable display of non-partisan solidarity.

A unanimous Senate voted to reform the disparity in March, and the House passed the bill at the end of July. With conservative sponsors such as Tom Coburn and John Cornyn joining progressives like Richard Durbin and Al Franken, Congress finally acted to correct this horrible injustice. Rep. Dan Lungren, a former California Attorney General, delivered a statement to the House endorsing the act, saying, "I believe that this is what justice should be about. This is a well-crafted bill, a good compromise; it serves the ends of justice and fairness."

The bill was also supported by a vast number of associations and advocacy groups of all stripes. The Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, the National District Attorneys Association and the International Union of Police Associations joined groups such as Prison Fellowship, Families against Mandatory Minimums, the National Association of Evangelicals, CitizenLink of Focus on the Family, members of the Congressional Black Caucus, and Asa Hutchinson, former head of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

The original policy mandated a 10-year minimum sentence for a drug dealer caught with only a candy-bar-size amount of crack. Yet dealers selling powder cocaine had to fill an entire briefcase in order to receive the same 10-year sentence.

Enacted in 1986, the disparity was largely based on the understanding that crack cocaine was more dangerous than powder cocaine because it was instantly addictive and provoked violent behavior. Since then, copious amounts of scientific evidence and U.S. Sentencing Commission analysis have shown these differences to be exaggerated or even false. Sadly, the disparity led to a hugely disproportionate number of black Americans being sentenced under this mandatory minimum law.

Also, the disproportionally harsh crack penalties fell mostly on low-level cocaine offenders, who are at the lowest end of the distribution chain and often have no previous criminal history. According to an analysis by the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation, only 7 percent of federal cocaine cases have been directed at high-level traffickers. Instead, federal authorities have squandered huge amounts of resources on small cogs in the cocaine distribution network: One-third of all federal cocaine cases involve an average of 52 grams - the weight of a candy bar. Not only is this a terrible misuse of federal time and talent, but it has also clogged the federal courts with cases that could be handled easily by the states. To really stop the flood of cocaine entering this country, federal resources should focus on high-level traffickers. Despite its hefty price tag, the crack-powder ratio made no substantial dent in the cocaine trade.

The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 restores common sense to our drug sentencing system. The 100:1 powder-crack disparity is reduced to just 18:1. The five-year mandatory minimum for simple crack possession is eliminated. The individual circumstances surrounding a drug crime are taken into account, while penalties for major cocaine traffickers are increased. And, the law addresses concerns about violence associated with crack use by recommending a guideline increase for drug crimes involving violence.

Federal laws should reflect the values of liberty, equality and compassion. The enactment of this responsible sentencing reform will advance all of these values. It puts an end to excessive deprivations of freedom; it treats drug offenders with fairness and equality, and it demonstrates compassion for those who commit minor offenses yet deserve a second chance to fulfill their responsibilities to family and community.
The Fair Sentencing Act is a victory for US drug policy, for Americans of every color, and for fairness in the criminal justice system.

[Image courtesy of The White House. President Obama signs the Fair Sentencing Act, surrounded by supporters.]

The House of Representatives this week joined the Senate in passing legislation that would significantly narrow the gap between statutorily mandated sentences for crack cocaine and powder cocaine, "a step toward ending what legal experts say have been unfairly harsh punishments imposed mainly on blacks," The New York Times reports.

The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 now awaits signature from President Barack Obama, who said during the 2008 presidential campaign that the sentencing disparity "disproportionately filled our prisons with young black and Latino drug users."

Under current law, the amount of powder cocaine triggering a mandatory minimum sentence is 100 times as much as the amount of crack cocaine triggering sentencing. The bill was passed in 1986 after a spate of drug-related killings.

The new law would decrease the ratio to 18-1 and eliminate the five-year mandatory minimum sentence for simple possession of crack cocaine.

"Never before have advocates for crack cocaine sentencing reform been so close to the finish line," writes Laura W. Murphy, director of ACLU's Washington Legislative Office, recalling when she convened the first conference on the crack/powder disparity 17 years ago.

"The ACLU has remained steadfast to eliminating the disparity completely," Murphy writes in The Huffington Post. "However, now that the Senate has acted to pass a reform bill that falls short of our ideal, we must confront the reality that it will nonetheless make important improvements in the lives of many people who would have otherwise been locked away for years, or decades, on end."

A statement from the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law also acknowledged that the bill is "not optimal" but applauded the bill's passage as a development that "should not go unnoted."

"The fight is not over," said Lawyers' Committee Public Policy Director Tanya Clay House.

For more on reforming disparities in criminal justice sentencing see video of an ACSblog interview with the Open Society Institute's Senior Policy Analyst Nkechi Taifa. Her interview followed and ACS event on reforming the criminal justice system, including its disparaties in sentencing. Video of the entire panel discussion, "Reorienting Federal Criminal Justice Policy -- An Opportunity for a More Integrative Approach?," is available here.

The U.S. criminal justice system should take a lesson in improvement from the medical community's model of embracing day-to-day errors as "important opportunities to illuminate hidden flaws," recommends the author of a recent ACS Issue Brief.

"The pattern in criminal justice has been to wait for the catastrophic miscarriage of justice. Everyone then looks for an individual or an agency to blame," writes James M. Doyle, a lawyer with Carney & Bassil and former head of the Public Defender Division of the Massachusetts Committee for Public Counsel Services, a statewide public defender agency. "The organizational accident approach is not only a more accurate way to describe what happened in a wrongful conviction; it opens a more productive avenue to remedial action."

In "From Error Toward Quality: A Federal Role in Support of Criminal Process," Doyle proposes the federal government create a national template for routinely reviewing "helpful errors" and dispense funding to localities for analysis of such errors by "everyone-to-the-table" teams of police, prosecutors, defenders, judges and any other relevant players, such as victim's advocates or probation personnel.

Doyle suggests that a federal "learning-from-error initiative" will help identify problems that undermine compliance with the Sixth Amendment, and move the criminal system away from the counterproductive practice of blaming one person or agency for high-visibility errors.

Doyle's Issue Brief is the second in an ACS series on roles the federal government can play in addressing the persistent crisis in indigent defense. Attorney General Eric Holder, Congress, and many other federal policymakers have identified reform of the indigent defense system as a priority.

In the first Issue Brief, "A Legislative Approach to Indigent Defense Reform," law professor Cara H. Drinan writes that the nation's system for upholding the right to counsel for indigent defendants is woefully lacking and needs a strong response by the federal government.

Doyle's Issue Brief is available here. For further discussion of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, view the video of ACS 2010 National convention panel discussion, "The Federal Role in Improving Indigent Criminal Defense." Southern Center for Human Rights President and Senior Counsel Stephen B. Bright talked with ACSblog about reforming indigent defense services following his participation in the "Federal Role" panel. His interview is available here.