Recourse against public defender? Conflict of Interest?

[CDAN99]

Dear Soc.

The state hired this particular Public Defender (PD) in it's case for an outstanding and large CS amount owed against me. I have been paying CS according to my revised CS orders regularly (which includes an additional amount for arrears) for many years now and the PD insured me that additional interest does not accrue as long as I am paying what the revised order says (and I have). But now (many years later) the PD says I owe a huge amount of additional CS as interest because no one ever filed to have the interest accumulation stopped in court. The PD fell short of blaming himself for the error but that is exactly what happened.

I have a major problem with this mainly because the PD was hired by the State and has cost me an additional outrageous amount of money to the benefit of the ex and the State for which I can never repay. Can we say "Conflict of Interest?" This is money I never had and yet the extorsion level becomes greater the more I comply. I have been working many more hours above my regular work hours so that I can attempt to afford to live and pay current support and arrears but they just raised the CS support level accordingly so that less goes towards arrears with my current OT wages. It is a viscous circle I cannot afford to live. I am at the point where I cannot afford to work. I want to just give up and have them keep me in jail forever since the system is purposely keeping me down.

Is there anything I can do? Can I sue the PD and the State for the damage they have caused in this conflict of interest?

Thanks Soc.

[socrateaser]

>Is there anything I can do? Can I sue the PD and the State for
>the damage they have caused in this conflict of interest?

You can sue the PD for malpractice, assuming that the statute of limitations for attorney professional liability has not run out (varies by jurisdiction), and assuming that you can prove that "but for" the attorney's failure to act in your best interest, that your total arrears would be smaller than they are.

You can't sue the State, unless you can prove that the State coerced the attorney to not file to have the interest on the arrears reduced (this would be nearly impossible without inside information from some State employee).

[CDAN99]

>You can sue the PD for malpractice, assuming that the statute
>of limitations for attorney professional liability has not run
>out (varies by jurisdiction), and assuming that you can prove
>that "but for" the attorney's failure to act in your best
>interest, that your total arrears would be smaller than they
>are.

Thanks, Soc. I have an appointment to see another attorney on this matter next week.