Zeev's Turnips Talk Politics (ZTTP)

[ergo sum]

The county is suing the state because it says it cannot afford to provide defendants with anything more than assembly-line justice. Mississippi is among a handful of states that provide no money for the defense of the indigent in noncapital cases.

The lawsuit, which will go to trial here this month, is in its way a commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Gideon v. Wainwright, which held that poor people accused of serious crimes are entitled to legal representation paid for by the government.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/15/national/15GIDE.html