Plan B?

Go it alone.
Go with the public defender.
Hire your own attorney.

 

The public defender is an attorney, just like any other attorney.

 

Prosecutors don't want trials for bottom of the barrel druggies, They take time and cost money. If you plead not guilty and start asking for "discovery" you are likely going to be offered a plea deal.

See:

how do i defend myself against a criminal drug possession charge at DuckDuckGo

 

Your options are pleading guilty, pleading not guilty if you have not yet entered a plea, coming up with money to pay a lawyer to represent you, ask for a public defender (PD), or represent yourself. By far the worst of those is the last one: representing yourself. You aren't an attorney and you don't know the rules of procedure and evidence, nor do you have any experience in dealing with the prosecutor. You could easily say or do something representing yourself that makes matters worse, not better. Rarely have I seen a defendant represent himself/herself and come away better than what a PD can do for them. The PD's deal with the prosecutors often and have a good idea what kind of plea deals they are likely to offer/accept. They also know when and how to challenge the state if the cops screwed something up in the investigation and arrest. They'll spot things that you don't have the experience to know might be a problem.

The public defender is an attorney. Like with private attorneys and prosecutors, a few PDs are really great, a few of them are really terrible and most are somewhere in the middle. You had a bad experience with one PD. That doesn't mean that they are all that way anymore than having one bad customer service experience with a store cashier means that all cashiers are that way. But even with a bad attorney you are better off than representing yourself. If the lawyer does a truly bad job representing you then you can file a motion for a new trial with a different lawyer citing ineffective assistance of counsel. If you represent yourself and screw it up, you have no option for a do over as a result of your mistakes.

 

That's overly simplistic, Jack. Whether a deal is offered and the exact details of any offer depends on a lot of factors. But receiving discovery requests is not one of them. Handling evidence requests is a routine part of the job and in every case where an attorney is representing the defendant the defense attorney will ask for discovery if the state doesn't turn it over first as some states require. It is true that over 90% of criminal cases result in a plea bargain. That's because most of those charged are, in fact, guilty and don't want to run the risk that the judge will impose a tougher sentence than what the prosecutor has put on the table for a plea offer.

When representing themselves a defendant won't know a good plea offer from a bad one or how to counter a bad plea offer with something better. And the defendant can easily say or do something that makes his/her situation even worse.

 

It sure does. If the stop was for a routine traffic stop and it was prolonged beyond what was necessary to complete it, and depending on the facts, an attorney might be able to get further evidence of a crime suppressed. You need to be represented by an attorney.

 

It's more likely that they discovered probable cause to search your vehicle.

 

What do you think that probable cause might be stemming from a traffic stop?

If a car is stopped for a routine traffic infraction the police can no longer use unrelated probable cause to prolong the stop unless there is obvious evidence of a crime without questioning the driver or passengers. That is what the ninth circuit court just ruled in a CA case on Sept 12.

In this case, the driver was pulled over for a broken stop light and suspicion that the car was stolen. . The police questioned the driver about what he may have in his car. They did find marijuana in the car and the evidence was suppressed.

The courts are moving in this direction more and more.

A seizure violates the Fourth Amendment when an officer "extend a traffic stop with tasks unrelated to the traffic mission, absent independent reasonable suspicion." United States v. Landeros, 913 F.3d 862, 866 (9th Cir. 2019). "This `mission' is limited to `address[ing] the traffic violation that warranted the stop' and `attend[ing] to related safety concerns.'" United States v. Evans, 786 F.3d 779, 785 (9th Cir. 2015) (quoting Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 354 (2015)). "Tasks not related to the traffic mission . . . are therefore unlawful if they `add[] time' to the stop, and are not otherwise supported by independent reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing." Id. (quoting Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 357).

United States v. Williams, Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit 2023 - Google Scholar

 

Wait, do you really think I'm going to list all of the possibilities? Thanks for the laugh.

 

It happened when I tried to quote from the court decision on previewing the post and I couldn't change it and I did try. I tried to delete the passage and repost it several times.

 

I'm glad you got some humor out of it. But I don't think you got the point of the post.

The point is that if the police don't have independent (of the traffic stop) reasonable suspicion of a crime they can't prolong the stop looking for a crime.

So unless the police can see something obviously a crime during the stop without asking unrelated questions to the traffic stop there is no probable cause.

So with that in mind, what probable cause could they have had?

 

While true, it really doesn't have anything to do with what I said.

BINGO!

I wasn't there. I can guess at tons of different things, but that doesn't do any good, does it? My opinion still stands that, in the matter that the OP referenced, it is less likely that the cops "created" probable cause and more likely that the cops DISCOVERED probable cause.