Episode 07 - Cases & Compassion: Jessica Glendening, Seventh Judicial District Public Defender

Douglas County Sheriff Jay Armbrister interviews Jessica Glendening, chief public defender in Douglas County, in a conversation about different aspects of the legal system. 

Glendening discusses her 16-year career in criminal defense, including her roles in Shawnee and Douglas counties. She explains the differences between public defenders and retained attorneys and prosecutors, the challenges of managing caseloads and the importance of addressing clients' non-legal needs. Glendening also highlights the misconceptions about public defenders and the adversarial nature of the legal system. 

She emphasizes the rewarding aspects of her job, such as helping clients with mental health and substance abuse issues. The conversation underscores the collaborative efforts in Douglas County to support reentry and community well-being.

Chapters

• 1:22 Jessica Glendening, Chief Public Defender in Douglas County
• 3:25 What a Public Defender Does
• 8:58 Appointed Attorney Process
• 15:12 Common Misconceptions
• 19:08 Importance of Public Defenders
• 23:53 How Attorneys Approach a Case
• 26:54 Support for the Public Defender Offices
• 32:23 Dynamics of Defending Clients
• 41:52 Human Side of the Courtroom
• 46:43 Favorite Holiday
• 48:24 Fun Questions to Wrap Up

Transcript

Jay Armbrister: 0:10

There's very few things that are as selfless as coming into law enforcement, into the corrections, coming to a sheriff's office in this day and age

Unknown: 0:21

from the heart of the country in Douglas County, Kansas, this is view from 100 a behind the scenes look at law enforcement community and the stories that shape our county.

Jay Armbrister: 0:31

It's an honor and a privilege to serve not just the community but my community. I mean, I was born and raised here,

Unknown: 0:37

hosted by your sheriff, Jay armrester, bringing you insights from the badge and beyond.

Jay Armbrister: 0:48

All right. Well, welcome back to episode number seven. I'm being told here of the view from 100 Podcast. I'm Jay Armbruster. I'm the Douglas County Sheriff here in Douglas County, Kansas, and this is kind of a new foray for us again, heading into the podcast world, just to reach out to you know, the nine viewers and my mom who like to listen to this thing. But we've, we've got one special episode for you today, that one I've been looking forward to from the beginning when we decided this, because I find this topic extremely fascinating, because it's so far out of my lane of travel. But we have Miss Jessica. Jessica Glendening here with us today, and she'll explain who she is, but she she basically is criminal defense attorney and works, works within the courts in a very specific role. And I'll let her explain all of that too. But we just want to talk about what it is that she does, what it is that you do miss Glendenning, and why you do it, and how long have you been doing it, and what keeps you in it? So, so without that, or with, without further ado, who are you? What brought you to us, Douglas County, what keeps you here, and what? What is it? What is it that that is? What's your What's your why?

Jessica Glendening: 1:58

Well, I'm Jessica Glendening, and I'm the Chief public defender here in Douglas County. I've been here for two years. This time. Before that, I was working in Shawnee County as the chief public defender, and before that, an assistant public defender for about seven years. I've been doing criminal defense since 2006 mostly public defense, but about two or three years when my children were little, I did some I left the public defender's office and was in private practice so that I had a more flexible schedule. Yeah, but I've been doing it for quite a while now. I'm happy to be in Douglas County. I've been a resident of Douglas County since I sure came here for undergrad, so I've been commuting for most of my career. And I'm happy to be local at this point for

Jay Armbrister: 2:52

sure. Well, you said this time in Douglas County? Have you? Have you worked in Douglas County before?

Jessica Glendening: 2:58

So when I I started as a public defender in Johnson County in 2006 and I was there for about six years, and then left. And when I was in private practice for a few years, I was here in Douglas County, okay, got some of the surrounding areas,

Jay Armbrister: 3:13

sure, sure, sure. So as a public defender, kind of, you know, we always everything in this world seems to be based off what we see on TV and and I think that that in my line of work, that that plays a lot into what people their perspective is on what law enforcement especially, you know, the CSI effect, where they think you can solve a case in an hour and have them prosecuted. But how, how is your role different, first off from a prosecutor, but also, how is your role different from other criminal defense attorneys?

Jessica Glendening: 3:47

Well, yeah, it's funny. You mentioned TV. That's basically how I ended up here. And really I wanted to be a detective when I was a kid.

Jay Armbrister: 3:55

Oh no, you don't. Yeah, the dog caught the car. You don't want that law and

Jessica Glendening: 3:59

order. And I eventually ended up in law school, and originally, I wasn't sure I wanted to do defense versus prosecution. I interned for a summer at the US Attorney's Office, and just sort of, I realized that's not my temperament, that's not where I'm the best fit. You know, they're kind of, they're opposing roles, and the prosecutor is the one who is charging cases and pursuing charges and penalties against people who are accused of committing crimes. They are the state. They're the state, and we are not, although I work for the state, which is where things get messy, but public defenders are a specific group of criminal defense attorneys. So if you were doing the little bubble thing, there's a big bubble that's criminal defense, and the little or bubble inside is public defenders. Criminal Defense is anyone who's representing a criminal defendant, and it can include public defenders or private counsel, and sometimes private counsel take appointed care. Cases, and then they're similarly situated to public defenders, but we only take cases that are appointed by the courts when someone can't afford to hire an attorney. Okay? So in Kansas and every state is very different. So when I talk to public defenders in other states, their systems are set up very differently than ours, and so you see a lot of variation. And I honestly think we have it pretty good in Kansas. I talk to people in other states, and they're like, my caseload of 300 cases and 40 murder cases, and I'm like, can't really do that and do that well, right? So we have a much, I think better system than some other places, but we're a state agency. Our agency oversees all the public defender's offices across the state. We don't answer to anybody, so it's not like, if I make the government mad, I'm not going to get paid. So like, sometimes people think, well, you work for the state, you're just going to get me convicted. Sure, and it's not like that, because I get paid the same either way, and we don't really have that kind of oversight, but we are paid by the state. Our agency also is the one responsible for paying private counsel that does appointed casework, so our agency oversees both but our offices are specifically all public defense, all felony cases. The only thing we don't do that is death penalty. They have a separate special counsel that do death penalty cases. But we do anything else that's a felony, where we get appointed by the court.

Jay Armbrister: 6:40

So when you say you don't do death penalty, that doesn't mean you don't do homicide or murder trial, so to speak. It's just only the ones that have been tagged as the possible or being charged as a death death penalty.

Jessica Glendening: 6:51

Yes, okay, they charge them specifically as a capital offense, if it's going to be a death penalty. And it doesn't always even mean that they're seeking the death penalty, it's a special designation for homicides that meet certain criteria, like if there's more than one victim, or if there's aggravating factors. So those cases, because the stakes are much higher, they have very specialized attorneys that do nothing but death penalty work, and so we don't do those, but we do other

Jay Armbrister: 7:20

Sure? Yeah, no, I believe in your two years, you've represented at least one that I know of, but you've had a couple of homicide cases that you've had to defend. Yep, okay, now, I was involved in Franklin County in the I don't know what was that? 2014 or 2016 whatever, the Kyle flack case that was that, and he's currently waiting on death row. And that process was my first experience with where they actually had to bring in, I can't remember. They called that panel. They had a special like, nickname for this group

Jessica Glendening: 7:49

of attorney is death penalty defense unit.

Jay Armbrister: 7:53

Oh, they had, no, we the police had, yeah, it was, but it was, it wasn't, it wasn't an unfriendly one, but it was basically like, you know, you're getting this one specific group of attorneys that are that that's all they do, and they're going to come in and look at everything you do. So you better make sure that you're, you know, not that we're, you know, lackadaisical and everything else, but they're like, man, you can't screw around on these.

Jessica Glendening: 8:13

Was that, like, through the Attorney General's office? I believe so,

Jay Armbrister: 8:17

okay, I believe so. Yeah, it was obviously, being in Franklin County, I didn't have a lot of to do with anything other than investigation, but, but, yeah, I just remember there being this one guy. Maybe it was the death panel. They just called him the death panel attorneys or something like that. But it was, it was something very similar. So, so, so let's say that I'm, I'm in Douglas County, and I am charged with, I'm trying to think of a third DUI, which is a felony, and I have a good job, and I make good money, and I go to court on the date that I'm supposed to be there, and the judge says, Do you have an attorney? And I say, No, how do I end up with you? Or how do I end up with you or your office? Or how do I not end up with you or your office?

Jessica Glendening: 9:03

So the judges have anyone who might need an appointed counsel fill out a financial affidavit, which, I believe it follows the federal poverty guidelines. But if you are unable to afford an attorney, and sometimes even if you have a job and make money. Attorneys are very expensive, and especially if you have a more serious charge, the average person really can't afford to hire an attorney. So the judges evaluate that we don't get involved. The judges evaluate whether they qualify for appointed counsel under the guidelines, and if they do qualify, then they could appoint our office,

Jay Armbrister: 9:41

okay, all right. And how do you manage a caseload? Because just having been involved in the criminal justice system, especially our jail, where we take people to court us on first appearances, where they would get or arraignments, a lot of people that come through, especially in the jail, would quote. Qualify. How? How do you manage caseload? Because I can only imagine that they they can give you as many as they want, but there has to be some sort of balance so you don't have 30 homicides.

Jessica Glendening: 10:11

And per this is one of the things that is unique about Kansas and that I do really appreciate. I'm not sure all the judges feel the same, but the way our system is set up, our regulatory rules say that we can stop accepting cases once we are unable to follow through with them properly. So there's national guidelines on how many hours of work it typically takes to do certain levels of cases. And they've done a lot of case studies across the United States in different jurisdictions, and found that even though the laws vary from state to state, it's pretty similar. They group things by type of crime and then how much work typically has to go into preparing a defense on that case. And so we've adopted from those national guidelines, recommendations of how many cases attorneys should carry at any given time. And once we hit the point where all of my attorneys are getting to that cut off, sure I notify the courts that we're not going to be able to accept any new cases until we've worked through some of our caseload and will close down for a while, okay, which means that the courts then have to appoint private attorneys who have agreed to accept appointed cases. When our office is closed down and can't take cases, okay,

Jay Armbrister: 11:32

that's so. It's not, it's not a set like I have 10 attorneys in my office, and each one of them can only take 10 cases. So when my office hits 100 we shut it off. It's a bit more fluid than that,

Jessica Glendening: 11:45

yes, and it's which makes it harder to describe. But I think, like, I think a homicide case is, like, worth eight case units, sure, and a probation violation is worth a half case, gotcha, and a theft would be one case unit. And so everything's assigned based on how many hours. And then attorneys have a set range of Case Unit numbers that they can accept. And so then the attorneys who are doing higher level cases that have more points, they do less of them because they need more time for those cases. So it's not a set number per attorney. It's kind of based on what level

Jay Armbrister: 12:23

of case that makes that makes total sense. At what point is, Are you or your office done with a case? Quote, unquote, done? Is it at sentencing, during that disposition? Is it, you know, post probation, parole? At what point are you off?

Jessica Glendening: 12:41

So we will close out a case after you left out acquittal when we win, it's closed.

Jay Armbrister: 12:51

Fair enough, fair

Jessica Glendening: 12:52

when the case is finished with its initial run. So that could be either a sentencing or a dismissal or an acquittal. Acquittal

Jay Armbrister: 13:00

is even more hard fast. We are out,

Jessica Glendening: 13:03

but at that point, we will close out the case, but we kind of remain that person's attorney if they're on probation. So okay, when you when it's an appointed attorney on the panel, they close out the cases and withdraw and they're done, and they have to be reappointed if there's a probation violation, we kind of continue our relationship with our clients, so when they're on probation, they're still our clients. We're not actively doing anything. It's not part of our case numbers at that point. But if a motion to revoke probation gets filed, or if there's a problem, we reopen the case and get back into it. But we also then stay in contact with our clients if there's issues or problems, and try and help them work through that.

Jay Armbrister: 13:46

That seems to make the most sense for continuity sake. I mean, if you've already worked this person all the way through to sentencing in their own parole or probation or whatever it is, it would make sense that you would you would already know the case. And so okay, that makes total sense. I but I wondered about that, because then they have to reappoint you technically, once they get a PV or a probation violation, we don't, oh, okay, they just automatically,

Jessica Glendening: 14:10

our office will take the case and we stay on it. Okay, so when they're reappointed, we just get a notice, and then we get back, you know, reopen it. But we don't have to be separately, reappointed. Oh, just ours, unless we withdraw, for some reason, sure.

Jay Armbrister: 14:24

Okay, well, that makes total sense. So in the course in TV and movies, you always hear, you know, The Lincoln Lawyer, you know, and all these, these shows with these high, high priced, high end attorneys. But I think, I think that people lose sight of the fact that this is a very gritty, hard, extensive work load, especially doing criminal defense work that is not one that's going to put you in a high rise in apartment in downtown on the Upper East Side of. Very often. So what is it? What is it? What are the common misconceptions you run across as far as the work that you do? But also, I mean, everybody says, Oh, you're an attorney, you got to have a lot of money. You know? This is, this is probably not. You did, probably didn't get into this to make a bunch of money, would be my guess.

Jessica Glendening: 15:16

Definitely not. Or I'm failing fair. I mean, I think there's a couple of misconceptions. And one is like, I think you get one extreme, or the other people think attorneys are all wealthy and high to do, or they hear public defender and think you're not a real

Jay Armbrister: 15:39

lawyer, right? Yeah, this is the best, this is the only work you can get.

Jessica Glendening: 15:42

And I know when I started, I can remember people being like, well, can't you get some other job? And it was like, Well, yeah, actually, I had very good grades. I went and clerked for the appellate court before I became a public defender. This is just what I want to do. And I feel like that has changed a bit over time. I get less of that, sure, than I did when I started. Yeah. But really, the people who are doing this, the people that are in my office, you know, they're getting paid, but they're not getting paid. You know what they would make in the DAs office, even,

Jay Armbrister: 16:15

oh, really, yeah, okay, but oh man, they're

Jessica Glendening: 16:19

there because they really like the work and they care about it. Yeah, like working with their clients. And, you know, there's a very it's a very interesting job, because we do a lot of just sort of weird problem solving things. We have clients with all kinds of issues, and trying to connect them to resources and figure out ways to work things out and help them with all sorts of different things, and it is very rewarding and just sort of unique to the position. So people do it because they really like it, yeah,

Jay Armbrister: 16:49

well, I or they leave, well, no, and that's, that's, I'm sure you have plenty of people who get into it with the best of intentions and realize it's just not for them, but I think that's, to me, that's the most fascinating part, and that's definitely where I want to talk more about is that years ago, coming up through law enforcement, obviously, I had, I had an image of criminal defense. They were just there, you know, to like, I always knew when they attacked me and my character was because I had had, I'd put together a good case. You know, that was, that was how I viewed. It like, Oh, they're only coming after me because that's all they got, you know. Or I really screwed something up, and they're hammering me. I'm like, can I just I made a mistake, you know, you know. And it felt but there was an attorney here in town and and this particular attorney, it took this statement that she said very much to the extreme, but she said, When referring in court, open court, to the prosecutors, that this is an advert adversarial relationship like that side and this side, we are adverse adversaries right now and and that person took it very much literal, I think, but I it wasn't until I really kind of had a chance to reflect on the fact that that people deserve their day in court, even if I believe them to be guilty, they still have The rights they deserve to have all of this happen, and the process has to play out, but it is ultimately kind of adversarial. And I'm curious how, how you chose, because you even said, like, this is what I wanted to do. You I could have done other things. So what part of it was it that that made you be like, This is what I'm going to be, this is who I'm going to be. This is what I want to do.

Jessica Glendening: 18:24

You know, I think I always say this, and it sounds silly, but it's really true. Like, if you put on a football game, and I don't care about either one of the teams, I'm going to root for, whichever one is the lower ranked team, I'm always going to root for the under underdog regardless. That's just sort of my personality. And I I kind of enjoy that I and I like the idea of the system doesn't work unless, because it's set up to be adversarial. The whole idea is that if either side isn't doing their job correctly, you're going to get to the wrong result. And so it's very important to have somebody on the defense side challenging everything to make sure that it was done correctly and that we're not missing things. And I have had clients over the years who were innocent, right? And, you know, we worked the case and investigated it, and I've I had several where the prosecutor dismissed it when I took them. Here's my investigation, which is the right thing to do, right? And, you know, the prosecutor did the right thing. It was just like an outside perspective, challenging that brought to light different information. And so, you know, I like that approach. I like being the one I don't think it has to be horribly adversarial. I am not the person that's going to go into court and fight with

Jay Armbrister: 19:43

everybody, yeah, but, but there are those attorneys

Jessica Glendening: 19:46

out there. There are those attorneys, but it's not my personality.

Jay Armbrister: 19:48

Oh, I just, I deeply respect there's, there's a certain set of defense attorneys that I, if I, if I saw they were on the case, I was just really glad, because I knew they were going to be fair firm, but fair, you know, and that's all you can ever ask for in anything. I. Um, I knew they weren't going to let me off, you know, if I did screw up or something, but I I appreciated the way they went about it and and that isn't always the case. Now, I've never been on a case with you, but you know, I think you what the things you're saying is exactly what, what I as law enforcement and as we as citizens want is that we want somebody to do the work, because these people deserve to have their rights intact, but we want to, we want to make sure that the right people are going to jail, like, I'm not opposed to putting people in jail as long as the right people, and they're there for the right reasons. And I think that's, that's the part that gets lost, and that's the work that you do, is to verify that we are putting the right people.

Jessica Glendening: 20:41

Well, I do also think it's really hard for law enforcement officers that have like, they work their cases, they go into court, they get on the stand, and like, I have had the experience of being cross examined in court, and it feels really terrible, even if you've done a good job, it feels really terrible, and you feel like you've done everything wrong, and you feel like you're being attacked. And so I know that I'm putting somebody in that position. I know how that feels to them. So like, I have some sympathy. I have to do my job, but I recognize that it feels terrible,

Jay Armbrister: 21:12

right? But again, you don't have to kick trash cans and stand on desks when you do it. And then that's, that's the part that I had, like, the best thing that ever happened to me as a law enforcement officer was getting my ass kicked in court. It made me so much better down the road. In fact, he's, his name is Brandon Jones. He was a, he's the DA down in Franklin. Yeah, Brandon, he was, he was an ADA early in his career here and and it was a DUI case, and he had this, this person had had paid for a very high end attorney out of out of the city and and I had made a mistake in my test, in my testing, roadside testing. Now it was still a good case, but I had, I was going to have to serve a penance. And he said, Jay, this guy is going to tear you apart, and there's nothing I can do as sitting there in the prosecutor table, there's nothing I can do to save you. You're just gonna have to endure it. And even that attorney's like, you know, I'm gonna, I'm not gonna be nice about this. I'm like, I respect that. And that's exactly what happened, but it made me better at my job. You know, I think Van Helsing says in Frankenstein or Dracula, he's like, we learn from our failures, not from our successes. And and I've, I've always really respected the attorneys who were just like, hey, you know, you screwed this up, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna use to my advantage. But I also want you to know this for future that, because, you know, they agree with what we do sometimes too. So, so I just deeply respect the way that some of them go about it, but, but again, there's others that that just really want to make, make a show of it. I'm just not a high drama person, yeah, no, and I respect that absolutely, yeah, let the others have that. So that does bring me to, you know, and again, I'm speaking anecdotally, but we, I worked in a high end, a high profile homicide case. He was the gentleman, was a professor at Kansas State, and he had allegedly killed his wife, which he was eventually committed, convicted of. But he hired an attorney, and this attorney was, was very well known, and he somebody asked him, like, what do you do if you know your client is guilty? And he says, I don't ask my client if they've done it or not. I don't even want to know if they have done it or not. I I have a system and I have a job, and that's what I'm here to do. And I always kind of took that away, like, that'd be very hard for me personally, because I want to know, like, you know, did you do it or not? But how do you reconcile that? Or is that something similar for you? How do you go about that?

Jessica Glendening: 23:49

You know, I think part of the issue for me is that you don't ever really know, and I've been wrong enough times to recognize that I am not a human lie detector, and I have absolutely believed that somebody was guilty and they were innocent, and we investigated it and realized it like, really, one of the cases the prosecutor dismissed was one where I was like, this makes no sense. There's no way that what you're telling me is true. But it turned out it was, you know, so, like, I am not a good I can't do that. I have to do the work and figure out, just like law enforcement does, like I have to do my investigation from the defense side, and I can't just have an opinion, because I could be wrong, sure. And ultimately, that's not my job. That's the jury's job, like my role in the system is to present my client's case and do all the work to put on the best evidence possible for my client, and the jury is the one that has the role of deciding, is this person guilty or not guilty? So I mean, I have to kind of just divorce myself, because you can really make yourself Correct. Crazy, and you can go down a really bad path thinking that you know the answer and you're wrong, right? You know? And I've, I've been wrong both ways at various points. So I just look at it like, that's not my role. Hey, my role is to do this, and then other people decide where to go from there.

Jay Armbrister: 25:19

Yeah, no, I think, I think that's, that's, that's totally fair, and I think it's actually pretty outstanding. Is like to, as you use your term, divorce yourself from that portion of it, because, again, like, like, that other attorney says, like, I have a job to do, and I'm going to stay within my lane of travel and do my job as best I can. Because ultimately, they can appeal and say that they didn't have a good like we see it all the time, where these high profiles cases, they'll run an appeal and say, I can't remember what the term is. They do ineffective assistance of counsel, basically saying I had a bad attorney and and to me, it seems like now in the cases I've seen, you know, I realized that those attorneys did do a good job, in my opinion, you know but that's just a way for them. They don't, but that's thing is, and that's what this entire system is set up is, is that I would rather let 10 or 100 guilty people go than incarcerate one innocent individual. And I would rather sit through 50 ineffective councils when they catch the right one, you know, and give that person another shot. I think it, you know. It can probably be overused at times, but, but again, it's like, well, you have to go through this because they deserve to have right into good counsel. I think what is the term you have to zealously defend your clients or whatever, which is pretty subjective. So No, I totally appreciate that fact. So about the nuts and bolts of your office? So you say you're funded by the state, state, what? How does that money get to your office? What does that come through?

Jessica Glendening: 26:53

I don't touch any money.

Jay Armbrister: 26:56

I'm trying to get an answer. So you guys are a bids office, B, I, D, S, what does that stand for?

Jessica Glendening: 27:04

So it's the board of indigence defense services, and we have an administrative office in Topeka that really handles all the funding side of things. So I have employees that are paid, you know, either hourly or salary. But that's not really within my purview. It's not what I do. Somebody their

Jay Armbrister: 27:25

paycheck, yeah, their paycheck says from the state of Kansas, yeah, but it comes through the bids the indigent, indigent defense services,

Jessica Glendening: 27:34

and they, I mean, they pay our rent, they pay all of our office supplies. If we need experts on a case. We get approval, but then they pay for those experts. So,

Jay Armbrister: 27:46

yeah, so you really don't, I don't. You don't even have a checkbook.

Jessica Glendening: 27:48

It's good and bad I don't have any money to spend. Yeah?

Jay Armbrister: 27:55

Well, yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. And your office is where

Jessica Glendening: 28:00

we're kind of right across the street from the courthouse. So we're at 1040 New Hampshire. It's an old historic church building. It's very cool building that was renovated into offices years ago and we took it over. We have the whole building as our office. Oh, you got the whole building? Okay, yeah. We have, actually our, one of our capital appeals groups is in the basement of our building, so we've got the main floor and the top floor for our trial office, and then we have a group of attorneys in the basement that do appeals on death penalty cases. Oh, really, conflict appeals. Oh no. We have a whole group of really smart people that we bombard with questions, I'm

Jay Armbrister: 28:42

sure, I'm sure, I'm sure. Well, and I guess that's that's a great question that I should have asked earlier, is like, if you have a client and they are convicted of a case and you said that you stay on the case through probation or whatever, but what if there is an appeal? Is that something you have to get permission from the state to file, or

Jessica Glendening: 29:03

there's a separate office called the appellate Defender's Office. Okay, it is a bids office, so it's another office within our agency, but they specialize in Criminal Appeals, and they get appointed to the appellate case. The only weird sort of exception is what they call an interlocutory appeal. So if I file a motion to suppress and I win, and the DA says that's wrong, I'm going to appeal it. They can appeal it in the middle of the case, because it impacts their ability to go to trial. Yeah. So they can file a special appeal mid case, and those are not killed by the appellate Defender's Office. So if you are unlucky enough to win a motion in district court and have the DA file an appeal, you have to then go to the appellate court. They're very different worlds, so trial attorneys not usually super keen to go talk to a panel. All the appellate I

Jay Armbrister: 30:01

see, and does that put put that case on pause while that appeal is handled.

Jessica Glendening: 30:05

Okay, yeah. And it can be kind of a lengthy Yeah, I had one where we won a motion. It got appealed, the appellate court reversed it, but then we asked the Supreme Court to look at it, because we thought the appellate court was wrong. And so then it went through two layers of Appeals, and the Supreme Court said, No, the district court judge was right, and sent it back and it, I think we were, like, a year or more dealing with appeals in case.

Jay Armbrister: 30:32

Yeah, was that so if a person is in custody, would that stop the process on their speedy trial, or any of that stuff as well.

Jessica Glendening: 30:41

It does. It stops the speedy trial. It doesn't get them out of custody, right? So sometimes they're sitting in custody for quite a while, okay? If so, there's very specific rules about when a district attorney can appeal like that in the middle of trial, and if they incorrectly appeal something they're not allowed to then the time of that appeal counts against the prosecutor, so it can put them in a position where they've burned up their speedy trial, but otherwise it just kind of puts it on hold and gets

Jay Armbrister: 31:13

back. That'd be tough if it because I know how lengthy that process can be. Moving at the speed of justice is, is not exactly complicated, to be

Jessica Glendening: 31:22

fast tracked, so they're supposed to go faster than a regular appeal, still not I see, still not the speed of light by any means.

Jay Armbrister: 31:30

Yeah. Well, I tell you what this is, kind of a question I ask a lot of people is like, if you could whisper into the brains of everybody in this community something that you think that they need to know about the work that you do, or the system in which you work, that you just think that is a common misconception, or something that that would help them understand what would Can you think of what something would be?

Jessica Glendening: 31:58

No, I think the biggest misconceptions are actually surrounding a large portion of the people that we deal with, and mostly related to mental health and substance abuse issues. And you know, you get a lot of like, well, yeah, but they should still know better. And there's just a lot of people that really don't understand the dynamics of like, how your decision making and your brain function is altered if you're dealing with a substance use disorder or a significant mental health issue. And so I think there's maybe a lack of sympathy sometimes, or a like, yeah, sure, that's really sad, but they still did something terrible, and they should have known better. And I think sometimes that's one of the things that we deal with the most, that people really just don't they don't understand because they don't have a frame of reference themselves. And it's not the sort of thing, you know, it's really hard for new public defenders that come in and they're like, Wait a minute. Nobody taught me how to deal with somebody who was psychotic. What am I supposed to do? Right? You know, it's a very it's something you don't encounter very much if you're outside the criminal justice system. So I think it's something that people really struggle to understand. Yeah.

Jay Armbrister: 33:15

So, I mean, I'm pretty sure the people, the attorneys, who only take clients that pay them, you know, through retainers, probably don't have to deal with folks who are incarcerated who have to be reminded to wear their underwear on the inside of their pants. You know, I mean, it's, it's, it's, I say that tongue in cheek, but it's, it's very much real that some of these people are so mentally unhealthy and unstable that it's hard to really even call them a criminal, or that they committed a criminal act because, but on the flip side is that they have and so they have to be held accountable to some, to some degree, we, you and I both have a front row seat to that, unfortunately, sometimes with with us being involved in the jail and you being involved in a lot of the and I think that the community, somebody said this to me years ago, and it stuck with me, and I've used it. I've used it 1000 times, but you can't use rational thought to try to explain what an irrational person was doing, and that can be whether you know, talking about somebody taking their own life or somebody committing a heinous crime, but that was in the middle of the in the throes of a mental health episode or something you can't be like, well, they should have known you can't do that. Well, they just didn't, you know, and you you know that, I know that, but they didn't. And it's that's a very difficult thing for people to and this is me going totally tangential into a soapbox, but I believe that this community is like the rest of the country, and that we love to try things in the court of public opinion. We like to take you know that now that the press can get affidavits, the probable cause affidavit, which is basically for those of you, you know, for the again, the nine of you that are listening, it. It's a sheet that, as a law enforcement, I fill out saying on this date, this time this subject did this, this and this, and it's I have to match these, these rules, or these, these things set out to to say that this person committed a crime, or that a crime was committed and this person did it for years. Those were kept because they were kept sealed, because if, if, let's say, there's a big case, big murder, homicide case, and people get that, they're going to get a lot of the information from the case, and it's going to be very difficult to get a jury pool to give that person a fair trial, because they've already heard all of these things that the Police allege, and people like to take those things as facts. And I know this is not even really sure. There's a question in here someplace that I'm going to want you, want you to chime in, but, but it just seems to me like we as a society have have really given a lot of attention to immediate fact or alleged facts, and then claiming that that is how it actually happened, without letting the process play out. So as a as a defense attorney, I can only assume that you fight an uphill battle, especially once an affidavit has been put in the newspaper on trying to walk some of that information back if it's flat, just flat, incorrect. Yeah.

Jessica Glendening: 36:22

I mean, I have two minds, and I I understand the idea of transparency and things right, but an affidavit is filed at the very beginning when someone is arrested, and it's based on what's known at the time. And it's not always completely accurate, and it hasn't been sometimes fully vetted yet, and things change, and I think it leads to a lot of frustration, because as somebody in the community, I see, here's the story about all these horrible things that someone did, and it's in the affidavit, and then later I see that there was a plea agreement for something way less serious. And you know, something is wrong with our system, is the kind of reaction to it, rather than recognizing that maybe things weren't what they appeared at the beginning exactly, and that maybe as things went along, everybody involved in the process learned more information, and we reached this end result. But no one sees that middle process, so they see the beginning and the end, and they, you know, rightly question, how did we get there? But really, they aren't allowed to have those answers many times and so

Jay Armbrister: 37:32

well, unless it's a unless it's high profile case, the press is not going to cover motion to suppress like, say that you know that that we searched. The police searched something that they should not have and found something that was incriminating, whether it was supposed to, is tied to the case or not, that can get thrown out. And, but in the affidavit, it says the police located this one thing that's super incriminating, but then it gets thrown out later, that doesn't get covered in the newspaper, and, and I think I just I feel bad a lot of times for the folks whose cases end up in the press, because I mean foundationally, as in this country, we're founded on the innocent until proven guilty. Well, when you put all of these allegations and alleged incidents out as fact at the beginning of a case, you're doing that person a disservice. So I understand why. Again, I too agree. I see why it is. I just don't like it, and I just it feels, it feels counterintuitive to the overall system, but, but then again, they don't ask me for opinions on a lot of stuff. I

Jessica Glendening: 38:37

also don't like it, and that was a law change. I want to say maybe 2011 or 2012

Jay Armbrister: 38:42

was when that sounds about right, and

Jessica Glendening: 38:45

before that, it wasn't the case that a probable cause affidavit was released. And I think it's to me, it's even more frustrating these days, because once something is out there on the internet, like, what if you were falsely accused of something, yes, everyone realizes it's a mistake. They dismiss the case like I had one in particular, where the DA said, Yes, this was a mistake. We're going to expunge this arrest, right? This, this shouldn't have happened. Yeah, it's still out in the newspaper, still searchable. It's still something that people find, and they never hear the story of you know, that was a false allegation, and this person was innocent, yeah? Because once it's out there, there's no way to recall that from Nope, you know, it's out there 100%

Jay Armbrister: 39:29

I mean, so it's hard we as an employer, we Google people nowadays like, you know, that's just part of what we do, but you have to be very careful about what you find, because a lot of it can be just flat out incorrect or hearsay, or somebody just trying to make a point, and it just not being fair at all, but, but you're right, that stuff is there forever, and I feel, I just feel like we owe people a bit more accountability when it comes to what we say, what but, but, yeah. Had. I can go on and on about the 24 hour news cycle and social media and everybody shouting opinion as fact, but you know, it's it, just it. People don't realize the long, long term effects. You know, that the comment section in a Facebook post can really have because that stuff is always there. And so I find it. I bet it's it's just made your job that much harder, would be my guess.

Jessica Glendening: 40:23

Yeah, yeah. It's sort of out of my control,

Jay Armbrister: 40:28

though. I know, well, that's for sure, no and same here, same here, but, but it's that's one of the changes I've seen throughout my career that I wish hadn't happened was, was the open release of no now for people, though there, there can they can get sealed, and the prosecution can off asked to have them sealed. The defense can ask to have him seal, but a judge has to have a ruling and take those into account. But for the most part, on your lower, lower level crimes, those don't get sealed. So

Jessica Glendening: 40:56

every very specific criteria before a judge can seal. It is that what it is they have to make specific findings of a reason why they shouldn't sure that case? Yeah, and it's a pretty high burden to get there,

Jay Armbrister: 41:08

but, but we've had it happen. I mean, I know there's some cases that are still ongoing in Douglas County that have had those sealed that that they people really want to read because, I mean, also, too, it's, they're, they're, they're shocking, I mean, and that seems to be what, what we as a society have really begin to wrap ourselves around, is getting the things that nobody else knows about. So, yeah, you know, yeah, this is that's much, much larger discussion and topic that's definitely not for me. So what else? What else? What am I not asking you about the work that you do.

Jessica Glendening: 41:45

You know, I think people see lots of courtroom stuff, and I think they don't always see the very human side behind it, and I feel like it's interesting. And when law students come in, or new attorneys come in, they're very surprised by how much work we do, sure, trying to solve problems that aren't aren't the actual case, right? You know, trying to help people figure out housing or get people into mental health treatment or substance abuse treatment, or, you know, I once spent months trying to get somebody connected with, you know, the special process to get Medicaid help, because it was someone who had an intellectual disability and had never had, you know, disability set up for sure, and so we couldn't get them housing until we had gotten their disability. And so, like, we had to go through this whole, like, Medicaid process. And, you know, spend months working through things that I know very little about, but we do that, and it really is some of the most rewarding stuff that we do, but it's not really what anybody sees. Yeah, and people don't realize how much effort goes in behind the scenes trying to help people with other things. You know,

Jay Armbrister: 42:59

no, I think. And that's kind of one of those deals, is like, it's not part of your job. But being a decent human, you're like, Man, I should really help this person just figure out their medication. Or

Jessica Glendening: 43:08

to me, it is part of the job. And I think I push back on that a lot, because it wasn't for a long time. And older attorneys, when I was a newer attorney, would be like, I'm not a social worker, right? I'm like, Well, no, but if we don't help this person, they're going to be back with the same problems, and you're just going to get another case. And so we can ignore it and say, That's not my problem, or we can accept that this is part of the bigger spectrum of what we do, and it has a bigger impact if we can make a difference beyond just what happens in the courtroom. So, I mean, to me, it is part of my job. It may not be.

Jay Armbrister: 43:46

It's exhausting being decent.

Jessica Glendening: 43:50

That's crazy sometimes, but it also can be really, really sure, amazing and rewarding. And, you know, it's those

Jay Armbrister: 43:58

little things too, I mean, and that is that's very true, that that that pure human interaction where you actually can see a tangible difference, because a lot of times the work we do, you don't feel like you're making any difference at all, because you're looking at, especially you and I in the criminal justice system, this this giant mechanism that we are just this speck of dust on, and you don't feel like you can do anything. But there are moments where you're just like, you're just like, Man, I actually that was really cool. And that's, that's the, that's the golf shot that brings you back, you know, makes you think you can keep playing. And that's,

Jessica Glendening: 44:30

yeah, I think we often don't see people repeatedly unless they have a probation violation, or they're not doing well, or they pick up a new case. And one of the coolest things is like, sometimes I'll have someone call me out of the blue, and it's been, like, four years, and they're like, hey, what do I need to do to get this expungement? And they'll tell me all about how life is going and and it's like, I could, I could run on those features for like, months. It's such a. Amazing feeling when somebody's like, hey, you know, I was walking down the street one time and a former client drove past and rolled down their window and was like, hey, Jesse, I've been sober for six months, and I'm like, way to go. And it's just like, sure, you know, that's the kind of stuff that you don't really see and you don't realize, but it makes a huge difference. 100% makes our job worthwhile. Yeah,

Jay Armbrister: 45:25

no, I am wholeheartedly with you. I've had being the store, you know, I love to go to checkers. It's my favorite place. But you know, you there's a wide variety. There's a wide cross section of life and cultured in there. But I had a guy come over. He's like, Hey, Jay, do you remember me? And I'm like, I don't. He's like, Well, and he told me. I was like, Oh yeah, I do. He says, This is my wife. You know, we're, we just got married. I've been clean for a year and a half, 18 months, and, you know, we're moving into this. I got a job here. I mean, it's just like, holy crap. Good job, man. Like, seriously, great job. And it's, it's those little wins that because I, I don't like as a law enforcement officer, I don't take any joy in putting somebody in prison because they've done something like, that's what we have to do sometimes. But there's no, to me, there's no joy in that. Like somebody had to lose something substantial in order for this case to even happen, and now this person and their family are suffering just as well. And to me, it's those little victories that that keep again, that run on those fumes for quite a while. So great point. I love hearing that. So what's your favorite holiday and why

Jessica Glendening: 46:41

I'm a Halloween fan.

Jay Armbrister: 46:43

Oh, so you're hitting your stride right now.

Jessica Glendening: 46:47

I don't know, Mike, I probably wasn't always, but my kids were super into it. My husband is super into it, and it just became a thing. And, you know, they watch horror movies all month. I hate horror. I like sort of the old school kind, but I'm not into the really ones you can tell aren't real. Yeah, I like the old monster movies. I don't really want to watch a slasher film. Yeah? No, no, but my family will watch them all month long, and they just, kind of, everybody gets all excited

Jay Armbrister: 47:15

about it. That's fun. I hopped off the scary train with the Thriller video for Michael Jackson's Thriller, I'm telling you, that still messes with me. Oh my god, where he looks up and his eyes are yellow and everything. Yeah, no, I'm

Jessica Glendening: 47:30

VHS, the making of thriller, and we would watch it over and over again.

Jay Armbrister: 47:34

Me too, my babysitter, one of the daughters, they had recorded it, and they had the VHS and yeah, it's still, I am not okay with that, but okay, why is, why is Halloween candy so damned expensive? Now it is really, I had to listen to my mom complain about that. The other

Jessica Glendening: 47:57

one of my biggest out of pocket expenses in my office is filling the candy bowl, and I go to Costco and I buy a huge bag of candy for, like, $25 and I fill up the candy bowls, and like, a week and a half, it keeps people happy.

Jay Armbrister: 48:18

Okay, the question I ask everybody, and it I have no idea if you know what this question is, but it's, it's very simple, what was your first concert? What was your most recent concert, and what was your favorite concert? Okay, the acceptable answers are, I've never been to a concert. I will judge you harshly. But the other acceptable answer is the same concert for all three.

Jessica Glendening: 48:44

Hmm, okay, I'm trying to remember. So I was a kid that went to in my hometown, there was a lot of all ages shows in this in the basement of this place called the Nordic Hall. Where was this? Where to fall, South Dakota? Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay. So I was trying to remember what the very first one I spent a lot of my teenage years, lots of angst, going to all ages shows, and I honestly can't remember what the first one was. Well,

Jay Armbrister: 49:13

what's the first one? You remember? What was the first one? You saved up money and bought a ticket for

Jessica Glendening: 49:17

you know? I i saw Green Day that way I saw Fugazi not I don't think it was at that place you saw Fugazi three times. Actually, I've seen Fugazi several

Jay Armbrister: 49:28

times. Oh, all

Jessica Glendening: 49:31

right, lots of concerts over the years. Yeah, some mild hearing

Jay Armbrister: 49:35

loss. Good for you. Yeah, absolutely. I'm very

Jessica Glendening: 49:38

proud of you. I went to chapel Rome last weekend. So that

Jay Armbrister: 49:41

was just not too long ago. I didn't even know that that chapel Roan, first off, I didn't know who chapel Roan was until a couple months ago. But then I was at Costco the other day, and there were like, three people wearing chapel Roan sweatshirts. I'm like, Well, show must. Must have been last night.

Jessica Glendening: 49:54

I got so many points with my kids because I was the first one who saw that it was announced. For like, a pop up show. And I texted my kids, and I was like, Hey, we could try and get tickets. And they I got major

Jay Armbrister: 50:07

Mom, that's cool. Where was it at? I didn't even it was at

Jessica Glendening: 50:11

Memorial Park down by

Jay Armbrister: 50:14

reunion station the world one Memorial what a great place to see

Jessica Glendening: 50:17

a show. She was fantastic. But it was like, it was flat, you couldn't see, if you're very far away. We were watching on a screen. Yeah, it was still a good time. But that's

Jay Armbrister: 50:26

where they used to have rock fest every year. And I've, I've got plenty of stories from going to those shows. I saw corn there one time, and it was fantastic, but it was fantastic for many other reasons besides the music. So, so what was your favorite show? Then, God? Oh, gosh, he didn't see like Bob Seger in 89 or something really cool.

Jessica Glendening: 50:51

Or, you know, it actually might have been. I saw David Bowie at Starlight, wow. And it was a really amazing show, like he played for a super long time, like it was a great set. All the things you wanted to see, weather must have been nice, yeah. And it was like, you know, that was probably early, 2000s Oh, that's and, you know, you would expect that from someone much younger at that point, like it was a fantastic show. Oh, wow, lots of stamina. Like, I probably couldn't.

Jay Armbrister: 51:24

It was great, good. Well, that's again, I've never been a David Bowie fan, necessarily. He was kind of outside of my my age, but, but I respect the work that he did and the people that came along behind him. Yeah, was a Ziggy Stardust. I think was his alter ego for a while there. So, yeah, it's very unique. Well, I can't thank you enough for coming on here and enlightening us, but also I just, I want thank you for showing the human side of the work that you do. Because I do, I do think that that just especially from law enforcement, you know, we view criminal defense as the enemy sometimes, and it's just not the case. And so, but I also think that people, I think you mentioned it one time, is that people just believe that different defense attorneys only represent monsters, and that's just not the case. So I appreciate you coming in here to let us know that. Well,

Jessica Glendening: 52:16

I would just like to say I've worked in a number of different jurisdictions, and one of the things I most appreciate about Douglas County is that people are very collaborative and are looking for solutions. And like, for example, your reentry team is fantastic, agreed do a lot of similar things, trying to help people get treatment and things like that. And they don't always, I don't think people always recognize that the sheriff's office is out trying to help right people, make those you know, connect with those resources and things. Douglas County is a pretty awesome place overall.

Jay Armbrister: 52:50

It really is, and I've said it before that this community is very good about putting its money where its mouth is. We we fund programs. Sometimes we fail, but we fund programs that we believe better is better to the people in the community, but the community as a whole. And that's one thing that I've I've, you know, we, as an agency, we don't rely hardly at all on federal or state money. The county has been very good about funding us to do the work that we do, and that gives us the opportunity to do that those kind of things, because a lot of there's a lot of people and a lot of sheriffs who believe that that the only job of the sheriff is more bars, more guards, more walls, more cars on the street and and we, just as a community, don't happen to agree with that, and I really enjoy being able to have that later lateral movement. So thank you again for coming on. It's been great. I know you told me early on that this was way out of your comfort zone, but you did. You did fantastic and appreciate everything you do for the community.

Jessica Glendening: 53:44

So thank you for having absolutely it is. And what I would say is, like, I don't typically like, I only will talk to the media if my boss tells me I should for some reason or another, right? Like, I trust you, I'm

Jay Armbrister: 53:59

willing to come talk to you. No, gotchas, trying to No, make me look dumb. No, no, no, I've got no agenda. No. In fact, I think, if anything, it's the opposite. I think that you guys deserve more, more of a positive light. And, and, and Jay 25 years ago doesn't agree with that. Jay Today absolutely sees we may have been friends, but not about work, so we'd have been talking about Fugazi all the time. All right. Well, thank you very much for coming on. You