What does it take to resolve a court appointed misdemeanor criminal case in Bell County, Texas? That’s what I wanted to know. I have taken myself off of the list of attorneys who will accept hourly court-appointed cases in Bell County due mainly to the fact that certain judges are not paying timely or adequately. I have been wondering if I shouldn’t take myself off of the flat-rate cases, as well. In order to determine whether it was worth my time, I needed to know how much time I was spending on a typical misdemeanor case. Fortunately, I track my time using my client-management software even when the case is paid at a flat-rate (in this case, $300 per case).
To begin, I took my billing data for my last ten court-appointed misdemeanor cases (where five of which were cases in which my client was in jail and five were cases in which my client was released on bail). I then combined my time records for each of the five similar cases and averaged both the tasks which were performed and the time required to perform those tasks. I also calculated how long it took to do each step in days. This gave me a very good idea of what it takes to resolve each type of misdemeanor case in Bell County.
This is how a typical misdemeanor plea is resolved in a situation where the defendant is incarcerated in the county jail at the time of appointment through resolution of the case:
| Day 1 | Review notice of court appointment from Indigent Defense Coordinator | 0.1 |
| Day 1 | Travel to Bell County Jail to meet with client | 0.3 |
| Day 1 | Stand in line at jail to see client, speak with deputy | 0.2 |
| Day 1 | Conference with client at Bell County Jail | 0.3 |
| Day 1 | Travel from Bell County Jail after meeting with client | 0.3 |
| Day 4 | Request discovery from prosecutor using online portal | 0.1 |
| Day 5 | Travel to Bell County Courthouse to pickup discovery | 0.3 |
| Day 5 | Check for discovery, learn not ready, re-request discovery while there | 0.2 |
| Day 5 | Travel from Bell County Courthouse after trying to pickup discovery | 0.3 |
| Day 6 | Obtain and review discovery (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.3 |
| Day 6 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 7 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 9 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 13 | Telephone call to prosecutor to confirm presence at courthouse | 0.1 |
| Day 13 | Travel to Bell County Courthouse to speak with prosecutor | 0.3 |
| Day 13 | Waiting while staff attempts to locate missing prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 13 | Waiting for prosecutor to be available once found | 0.2 |
| Day 13 | Speak with prosecutor, negotiate plea offer for time-served | 0.1 |
| Day 13 | Travel from Bell County Courthouse after speaking with prosecutor | 0.3 |
| Day 15 | Travel to courthouse for plea hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 15 | Obtain plea paperwork from court coordinator | 0.1 |
| Day 15 | Complete plea paperwork forms | 0.1 |
| Day 15 | Explain plea paperwork to client | 0.1 |
| Day 15 | Waiting in line to plead guilty with client | 0.3 |
| Day 15 | Plea of guilty with client before the judge | 0.1 |
| Day 15 | Travel from courthouse after plea hearing | 0.3 |
|
TOTAL TIME — |
5.0 |
So, the typical scenario with an incarcerated defendant who is motivated to resolve the case as quickly as possible is fifteen days with exactly five hours worth of effort by the attorney.
This is how a typical misdemeanor plea is resolved in a situation where the defendant is not incarcerated in the county jail:
| Day 1 | Review notice of court appointment from Indigent Defense Coordinator | 0.1 |
| Day 1 | Place telephone call to client only to discover phone no longer in service | 0.1 |
| Day 1 | Send correspondence to client notifying client of appointment | 0.1 |
| Day 1 | Attempt to request discovery, learn file not setup yet | 0.1 |
| Day 8 | Attempt to request discovery, learn file not setup yet | 0.1 |
| Day 15 | Attempt to request discovery, learn file not setup yet | 0.1 |
| Day 22 | Attempt to request discovery, learn file not setup yet | 0.1 |
| Day 26 | Request discovery using online portal | 0.1 |
| Day 27 | Travel to Bell County Courthouse to pickup discovery | 0.3 |
| Day 27 | Check for discovery, learn not ready, re-request discovery while there | 0.1 |
| Day 27 | Travel from Bell County Courthouse after trying to pickup discovery | 0.3 |
| Day 29 | Obtain and review discovery (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.3 |
| Day 29 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 34 | Travel to court for pretrial hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 34 | Arrive at 13:00 for 13:15 pretrial hearing and look for client | 0.1 |
| Day 34 | Conference with client to discuss case | 0.2 |
| Day 34 | Wait until 13:15 pretrial hearing actual begins at 13:30 | 0.2 |
| Day 34 | Travel from court after pretrial hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 41 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 43 | Attempt to speak with unavailable prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 49 | Telephone call to prosecutor to confirm presence at courthouse | 0.1 |
| Day 49 | Travel to Bell County Courthouse to speak with prosecutor | 0.3 |
| Day 49 | Waiting while staff attempts to locate missing prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 49 | Waiting for prosecutor to be available once found | 0.2 |
| Day 49 | Speak with prosecutor, negotiate plea offer | 0.1 |
| Day 49 | Travel from Bell County Courthouse after speaking with prosecutor | 0.3 |
| Day 49 | Place telephone call to client, phone once again not in service | 0.1 |
| Day 53 | Draft and send correspondence to client explaining discovery and plea offer | 0.3 |
| Day 61 | Telephone call to client, leave message | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Review telephone message from client left at 11:00 p.m. previous evening | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Telephone call to client, leave message | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Review telephone message from client left while I was in court | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Telephone call to client, leave message | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Telephone call from client who was screening his calls and had to call back | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Travel to court to reset plea hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 62 | Reset plea date because client does not want to accept plea offer | 0.1 |
| Day 62 | Travel from court after resetting plea hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 64 | Draft correspondence to client notifying client of new court date | 0.1 |
| Day 90 | Telephone call to client, leave message | 0.1 |
| Day 90 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 90 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 125 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 125 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 153 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 153 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 162 | Conference with client to discuss case | 0.5 |
| Day 181 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 181 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 183 | Telephone call to prosecutor to confirm presence at courthouse | 0.1 |
| Day 183 | Travel to Bell County Courthouse to speak with prosecutor | 0.3 |
| Day 183 | Waiting while staff attempts to locate missing prosecutor | 0.1 |
| Day 183 | Waiting for prosecutor to be available once found | 0.2 |
| Day 183 | Speak with prosecutor, negotiate new plea offer | 0.1 |
| Day 184 | Telephone call with client to discuss new plea offer | 0.1 |
| Day 216 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 216 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 244 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 244 | Reset plea date (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Telephone call with client to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Travel to courthouse for plea hearing | 0.3 |
| Day 272 | Obtain plea paperwork from county attorney | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Complete plea paperwork forms | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Explain plea paperwork to client | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Waiting in line to plead guilty with client | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Plea of guilty with client before the judge | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Travel from courthouse after plea hearing | 0.3 |
|
TOTAL TIME – |
10.0 |
So, the typical scenario with a client who is not incarcerated, and not motivated to resolve the case as quickly as possible, is 272 days with ten hours worth of effort by the attorney.
Taking the flat-rate fee of $300 and dividing it by the number of hours required to resolve each case shows that when the client is in jail, the county pays about $60 per hour. When the defendant is not in custody, though, the pay drops to $30 per hour.
Given my recent post about the cost of staying in business, I now see that I could go bankrupt very quickly doing these kinds of cases. That is good to know. However, after realizing that my way of resolving these cases was not fiscally viable, I asked several of my colleagues how they managed to accept court-appointments without subsidizing the county. First, they unanimously agreed that I was insane in spending so much time on each case. This is their method of handling misdemeanor court-appointments:
| Day 0 | Review notice of court appointment from Indigent Defense Coordinator | 0.1 |
| Day 1 | Send correspondence to client notifying client of appointment | 0.1 |
| Day 29 | Obtain and review discovery (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.4 |
| Day 33 | Speak with client by telephone to discuss case | 0.1 |
| Day 34 | Set case for jury trial (already at courthouse on other matters) | 0.2 |
| Day 267 | Speak with prosecutor about upcoming trial (already at courthouse) | 0.1 |
| Day 267 | Speak with client about plea offer | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Show up for jury docket call, obtain plea paperwork from county attorney | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Complete plea paperwork forms | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Explain plea paperwork to client | 0.1 |
| Day 272 | Plea of guilty with client before the judge | 0.1 |
|
TOTAL TIME – |
1.5 |
Ah, now I get it! That’s $200 per hour! I just need to quit trying so hard. That’s the lesson Bell County is trying to teach me. Hmm.