On June 21, 2016, plaintiffs, six indigent adults incarcerated in Utah jails and detention centers, brought this class action lawsuit in the Third Judicial District Court in and for Salt Lake County, Utah. The plaintiffs sued the State of Utah and the Attorney General of Utah under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and Utah state law. The plaintiffs, represented by private counsel and the ACLU of Utah, sought injunctive and monetary relief claiming violations of their Sixth Amendment rights, including plaintiffs’ right to effective assistance of counsel, and their Fourteenth Amendment rights, including right to due process. Specifically, plaintiffs alleged that the defendants failed to provide constitutionally adequate legal representation to indigent adults accused of crimes punishable by incarceration in Utah’s District and Justice courts.
Plaintiffs alleged that defendants’ failure to provide adequate legal representation was due to the state statutorily delegating the duty to provide indigent criminal defense to the individual counties and municipalities of the state, and then failing to provide funding, logical support, or oversight to the counties or municipalities. In support of their claim of failure to provide funding, plaintiffs alleged that Utah provided no financial support to any county or municipality in the state. Additionally, plaintiffs supported their claim with investigations and assessments conducted by the ACLU of Utah, the Sixth Amendment Center, and the Utah Judicial Council.
On July 1, 2016, plaintiffs amended the complaint to emphasize alleged harm on individually named plaintiffs.
The case was moved from the Third Judicial District Court in and for Salt Lake County to the United States District Court for the District of Utah on July 13, 2016. On July 20, 2016, defendants filed motion to consolidate case with
Cox v. Utah , a similar case in which the plaintiffs, indigent individuals in Utah charged within Washington County of Utah, alleged deficiencies in Utah’s indigent defense program. Then, on July 26, 2016, plaintiffs sought certification of a class comprised of all indigent adults charged or to be charged with one or more crimes in a District or Justice Court within the State of Utah.
On August 5, 2016, defendants filed a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim and for lack of jurisdiction. From August 8, 2016 through January 4, 2017, motions were stayed in consideration of the defendants’ motion to consolidate cases, but this motion was rendered moot after
Cox v. Utah was dismissed. District Judge David Nuffer then granted a partial lift of stay to rule on the defendants’ motion to dismiss, but the stay remained in effect for all other matters, including the plaintiffs’ motion for class certification.
On March 23, 2018, Judge Nuffer granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss, finding that the plaintiffs had failed to allege sufficient facts to establish their standing to sue or to state a claim. Specifically, he found that that there were insufficient allegations of an actual or complete denial of appointed counsel, insufficient allegations that the plaintiffs’ public defenders had entirely failed to subject the prosecution’s cases to meaningful adversarial testing, and insufficient allegations that the plaintiffs’ public defenders had been called upon to render assistance under circumstances where competent counsel very likely could not. Furthermore, Judge Nuffer found that the plaintiffs failed to sufficiently demonstrate a causal connection between their alleged injury and defendants’ conduct. Lastly, he found that the declaratory relief sought by the plaintiffs in their amended complaint, a judgment that the defendants were not complying with US and Utah Constitutions, did not meet the standard of redressability. 2018 WL 1472484. The case is now closed.
Cade Boland - 09/28/2017
Lisa Limb - 03/23/2019
compress summary
