Department of the Public Defender, County of San Diego

Mission:
"To protect the rights, liberties, and dignity of all persons in San Diego County and maintain the integrity and fairness of the American Justice System by providing the finest legal representation in the cases entrusted to us."

In 1988, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors voted to create an office with the mission of providing quality legal assistance to individuals charged with a crime in state court who are financially unable to retain private counsel. Thus the Office of the Public Defender was established. The current Department Director is Randy Mize and the Primary Public Defender Office’s Chief Deputy is Angela Bartosik. On occasion more than one person is charged with the commission of the same crime. It would be a conflict of interest for the same office to represent all defendants charged in the case. As a result, the Board of Supervisors voted and established a second public defender office in 1990. This office is called the Alternate Public Defender (APD). APD’s current Chief Deputy is Megan Marcotte. In 2005, the Multiple Conflicts Office - Major Cases (MCO) was created to represent people who are charged with only the most complicated and serious homicide and special circumstances cases throughout the County and accepts court appointments that the Public Defender and the Alternate Public Defender are unable to accept due to a conflict of interest or other order of the court. MCO’s current Chief Deputy is Richard Gates. In 2009, the County of San Diego consolidated indigent defense services (Primary Public Defender, Alternate Public Defender, Multiple Conflict Office, Juvenile Delinquency, & Office of Assigned Counsel) into one County Department. While these offices were combined they each stand as independent and ethically separate divisions of the Department of the Public Defender and our attorneys do not share information or otherwise interact with attorneys from the separate divisions. Mission: "To protect the rights, liberties, and dignity of all persons in San Diego County and maintain the integrity and fairness of the American Justice System by providing the finest legal representation in the cases entrusted to us."