Public Defender

In an attempt to ease a backlog of court cases, the Woodbury Heights Council voted 4-2 on Wednesday to hire the township's first public defender. Council President Raymond Groller read a letter from David Keyko, the township judge, stating that a number of cases had been postponed in recent months because the township lacked a public defender. The municipality must provide an attorney if the defendant cannot afford one in cases involving more than $200, the letter said. "With the mandatory drunk-driving fines now so high, this involves a lot of cases," said Groller, a Republican.

H. Ian Wachstein, the deputy public defender who has headed Camden County's public defender's office since 1972, will be demoted as part of statewide changes being made in the public defender's office by New Jersey Public Advocate Alfred A. Slocum. Beginning Jan. 1, Wachstein will no longer serve as the deputy public defender in the county. But Wachstein, 46, can continue to work in the New Jersey public defender system, although he said he had not talked fully about his options with Slocum.

Keir Bradford-Grey, the assistant federal public defender in Delaware, has been named Montgomery County's chief public defender. She assumes office April 1, replacing Stephen G. Heckman. Bradford-Grey has 13 years' experience as a public defender. She becomes the first African American woman to head a department in the county government. Josh Shapiro, chairman of the board of commissioners, said Bradford-Grey's "vision for the office and commitment to defending the indigent will help ensure that justice in Montgomery County is efficient and effective.

Municipal court clerk Dorothy Still says she has never liked Maple Shade's hunt-and-peck system for assigning attorneys to poor clients. And she's relieved that a change may be coming. "I have to call a lawyer to do something he probably won't get paid for," Still said. "Nobody minds. Nobody gets angry. . . . But I feel embarrassed sometimes. " For about a decade Maple Shade has relied on lawyers already scheduled for court to represent indigent defendants - usually for free.

It comes down to this: Attorneys in the Camden Office of the Public Defender are being asked to take time off without pay, and clients are being asked to pay a new $50 administrative fee - all part of an effort throughout state government to avoid layoffs. The prospect of an unwanted, unpaid vacation seemed remote to many workers in July when Gov. Florio's office asked department heads to find ways to reduce their budgets. The legislature had approved a $253 million cut in state spending through layoffs, attrition, early retirement and furloughs.

A reputed mobster with more than $1 million equity in three houses has been assigned a public defender after claiming he cannot afford a lawyer to represent him in a New Jersey racketeering case. And the state Attorney General's Office wants to know why. Alfonso Cataldo, 69, made the request last year after he and 34 other reputed members and associates of the Lucchese crime family were indicted for their roles in what authorities say was a multibillion-dollar gambling operation based in Morris County.

With his full gray beard and pin-stripe suits, Owen W. Nash looked like a college professor, colleagues said. So people who visited his private law office in Media were sometimes puzzled by the pictures of fighter jets that Mr. Nash hung on his walls. Only a few people who took the time to stare at the pictures figured out who the clean-shaven man in the flight suits was. Mr. Nash, 58, of Exton, an assistant public defender for Delaware County, and a decorated Navy fighter pilot, died Friday at Hahnemann University Hospital after suffering a heart attack.

Rosie O'Neill, 43, has a broken marriage, a well-meaning but presumptuous mother, a resentful office partner, an impossible job, an $80,000 Mercedes and, she complains, sagging breasts. She's trying to unload the car. Everything else, she's working on, with the help of her supportive sister, confused stepdaughter, gorgeous carpenter and expensive therapist. Sharon Gless plays Rosie, nee Fiona Rose O'Neill, a Beverly Hills-type lawyer who has left hefty legal fees behind to lend a hand as a public defender in The Trials of Rosie O'Neill, which premieres tonight at 10 p.m. on Channel 10. Most of the trials come outside the courtroom.

Joseph Hylan had two hours to save Kevin Scott Thomas from a possible five- year term in the slammer. Thomas, 32, had violated the three-year probation on which he had been placed by two Montgomery County judges for drug possession and receiving stolen property. While on that probation, he had been convicted by a Lehigh County court on charges of stealing $5.89 in candy bars and cigarettes from a convenience store - and Hylan had two hours to memorize his arrest record. Two hours to ask Thomas what went wrong.

New Jersey Public Defender Ivelisse "Ivy" Torres, 48, the highest-ranking Hispanic official in state government, died of pancreatic cancer Sunday. In July 1997, Ms. Torres, of Shrewsbury, Monmouth County, became the first career public defender to ascend to the top post in the state's Office of the Public Defender, which was created in 1967. "Ivy Torres was an extraordinary public servant and a special human being," said Gov. Whitman, who appointed her. "New Jersey is a better place because of her. " After beginning her career as a law guardian attorney and senior trial lawyer in the Public Defender Camden County Regional Office in 1979, she worked in the Union County regional office before transferring to the Ocean County office in 1987.

ATLANTIC CITY - Two sets of visitors to this seaside casino resort often mingle in the streets behind the glitter of the Boardwalk - tourists and homeless people from across the region - and something went dreadfully wrong in that uneasy mix Monday when a woman described as homeless and deranged plunged a 12-inch butcher knife into two tourists from Canada, killing both. Antoinette E. Pelzer, 44, who holds a Philadelphia driver's license but who a relative said had been homeless for five months and undergone treatment for schizophrenia, made a first appearance Tuesday afternoon in state Superior Court in Atlantic County.

A registered sex offender already accused in a federal indictment of exploiting a child to produce pornography, has been bound over for trial on charges of raping the toddler in Montgomery County. Police said Robert Knappenberger, 41, of Boyertown, Berks County, was being held at the Montgomery County prison when he could not post $15,000 bail. He is accused of rape, statutory rape, indecent assault, corruption of a minor, and endangering the welfare of a child. The child was 1-year-old at the time of the alleged crimes.

A REGISTERED sex offender, already accused in a federal indictment of exploiting a 1-year-old to produce pornography, has been bound over for trial on charges of raping the child in Montgomery County. Robert Knappenberger, 41, of Boyertown, Berks County, was being held at the Montgomery County prison in lieu of $15,000 bail, police said. He is accused of rape, statutory rape, indecent assault, corruption of a minor and endangering the welfare of a child. The images of the abuse were posted on the Internet, according to the 2011 indictment.

A registered sex offender already accused in a federal indictment of exploiting a child to produce pornography, has been bound over for trial on charges of raping the infant in Montgomery County. Robert Knappenberger, 41, of Boyertown, Berks County, was being held at the Montgomery County prison when he could not post $15,000 bail, police said. He is accused of rape, statutory rape, indecent assault, corruption of a minor and endangering the welfare of a child. The child was one-year-old at the time of the alleged crimes.

A Lower Merion woman has been ordered to stand trial on charges that she falsely told a grand jury that a township patrolman had sexually assaulted her and that she fabricated evidence to support that claim. Gabrielle Drexler, 26, of Rose Lane in Bryn Mawr, was bound over for trial on four counts against her during a preliminary hearing Tuesday before District Judge Margaret Hunsicker in Norristown. Drexler was charged by a Montgomery County grand jury last November with perjury, false swearing, tampering with evidence, and giving a false report to law enforcement officers.

Keir Bradford-Grey, the assistant federal public defender in Delaware, has been named Montgomery County's chief public defender. She assumes office April 1, replacing Stephen G. Heckman. Bradford-Grey has 13 years' experience as a public defender. She becomes the first African American woman to head a department in the county government. Josh Shapiro, chairman of the board of commissioners, said Bradford-Grey's "vision for the office and commitment to defending the indigent will help ensure that justice in Montgomery County is efficient and effective.

A 31-year-old Lansdale woman who failed to show up for court in Norristown three times to face an assault charge is done with dodging the law, a Lansdale police official said Monday. Stephanie M. Virgilio, of the 1100 block of W. Main Street in the borough, was wanted on a Montgomery County bench warrant for failing to appear in October 2008 to face charges of simple assault and harassment. Lansdale Police Sergeant Alex Kromdyk said police received information on Feb. 9 that Virgilio was about to flee with her children to South Carolina to avoid trial.

HACKENSACK, N.J. - A teenager charged with attempted murder in the firebombings of two New Jersey synagogues pleaded not guilty Wednesday. Authorities announced they would conduct a sweep of synagogues within a 10-mile radius of 19-year-old Anthony Graziano's home to look for arson materials. The Bergen County Prosecutor's Office characterized the search as precautionary and did not say it was prompted by a specific threat or by new information the suspect had provided. Authorities have contended that Graziano searched the Internet for synagogues near his home in Lodi and carried out his attacks using a bicycle as transportation.

Let the critics say what they may, Joseph Amendola - the outspoken and often unorthodox lawyer representing former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky - isn't one to be cowed by a little second-guessing. With a client facing 50 sexual-abuse counts, Amendola infamously made Sandusky available for not one, but two interviews with national media last month. With state prosecutors threatening to produce at least eight young men claiming traumatic abuse, he argued that many - if not all - came forward looking for money.