Chief public defender defends conduct
Bowden-lewis tries to keep job; ‘this is my life’
In what may have been an effort to save her job, Chief Public Defender Tashun Bowden-lewis argued through her lawyer Thursday that the oversight commission with which she has clashed for months lacks the authority to dismiss her.
Attorney Thomas Bucci told the Public Defender Services Commission near the conclusion of a 40-minute argument that it is “in error” in thinking it can remove Bowden-lewis. But just minutes earlier he seemed to have undercut his argument by reading from state law that gives the chief public defender authority “to direct and supervise” the division with the “approval of the commission.”
Bucci said “it is an erroneous concept that the commission has overarching authority over the chief public defender.”
Over 20 months in her position, Bowden-lewis has fought with the oversight commission over her assertions that she has control over hiring, policy and spending at the agency that represents the indigent and that she has been micro-managed and second-guessed because she is Black. Both claims were at the center of her lawyer’s argument Thursday.
Bucci was responding to a fourhour presentation earlier this month by the commission in which it presented 16 charges of mismanagement against Bowden-lewis that run from improperly accessing privileged email accounts to retaliating against those who disagree with her to repeatedly leveling unfounded allegations of racism.
The commission convened a special meeting at the Legislative Office Building Thursday to give Bowden-lewis an opportunity to respond. Although the commission can impose a range of discipline, it has become apparent that it is considering removal. Chairman Richard N. Palmer said at the meeting that a decision may not be made
for weeks.
Bucci attacked the disciplinary process the commission has established, which has involved presenting Bowden-lewis with charges and giving her the opportunity to call witnesses and mount a defense. Bucci claimed the procedure violates his client’s due process rights. He said she is entitled to a hearing on discipline before an impartial board, but he did not say what or where that board is.
On the question of who has the final word in division, hiring, policy and spending, Bucci claimed that state law governing the division is written in a manner designed to force the commission to reach an agreement on disputed matters with the chief public defender.
“She should not be punished for the failure of the commission to come to agreement with her,” Bucci argued.
Commission members remained silent through his argument.
Bucci also argued that the commission has not demonstrated that it has “just cause” to remove Bowdenlewis, a requirement for removal under state law.
More than one of the commission’s complaints against Bowden-lewis grew from battles over who has control over hiring. When a prior commission rejected her choice of a human relations director and hired another candidate, a subsequent investigation concluded that Bowdenlewis made working conditions for the new director so “intolerable” that she quit.
Bucci said state law governing operation of the division gives the chief public defender the power to “select” job candidates with the approval of the commission. Bucci said that means Bowden-lewis had the authority to select the human relations director and the commission overstepped his authority by rejecting her candidate.
“There is no question but that it says she selects the personnel, not the commission,” Bucci said. “I can’t find where her dispute over the authority to make appointments is a violation of any statute.”
Bucci also said the commission is wrong in accusing Bowden-lewis, the first Black woman to hold the office, of making baseless claims of discrimination.
Among other things, the commission has accused Bowden-lewis of defying its instructions given repeatedly over several months to hire a lawyer to assist the head of the division’s complex litigation unit, a department head with whom she was involved in a long running dispute.
Bucci claimed the assistant position went unfilled by white chief public defenders when it was first created, but no complaints were made or discipline imposed. That, Bucci said, is an example of Bowdenlewis’ claim of racial bias being justified.
Bucci also argued that the commision was violating federal civil rights law when it decided to reprimand Bowden-lewis for making claims that she has been discriminated against. He said that in order to complain of bias, Bowden-lewis only needed “a reasonable, good faith belief ” that she was the victim of racial bias.
Bowden-lewis spoke at the end of the hearing and said she would agree to a mediated effort to preserve her position, which she said was something she had aspired to throughout her life.
“This is my life,” she said. “Working for the indigent people of the state has been the focal point of my career.”
She said it is her ambition to recreate the agency by injecting it with diversity, equity, inclusion, access and justice, to “shake the system until it crumbles” and rebuild it.