- 1.1) Name & Pronouns
- First Name: Daniel
Middle Name: David
Last Name: Carmello
Preferred pronouns: he/him
- First Name: Daniel
- 3.1) Why are you interested in becoming the Chief Public Defender? How would this role align with your long-term career goals? (100 word minimum)
- When I had first been interviewed, I didn't have many long-term goals other than owning a private law firm. That was my goal when I first flew into the city. I've always seen this goal as something that will be achievable far in the future. While I have been apart of the public defense division, I have come to love my connection with my fellow attorneys and clients. The transition was simple because if I had any questions, I would ask my co-workers. Now I am one of the attorneys that people will come to when they have questions about their own cases, and I love that I am able to give my co-workers answers that will help them with their future as an attorney. I want to become the Chief Public Defender because I know I can help the defense division grow to a large group of hard-working attorneys. Where the defense division stands now is not a great place. We don't have many attorneys, our divisional paperwork is unorganized, and we don't have many incentives to keep going as a public defense attorney. These are things we need to keep our division running efficiently and for a long time.
- When it comes to complex cases, I have been involved in a few myself. I have had experience with complex cases with our previous chief and previous higher-ranking attorneys which had helped at the time when I was a junior and didn't know how to do much case work. What Junior Defenders need in these complex cases is additional help from higher-ups. This does not mean that the higher up should do the work for them, but guide them through the process and lead them to the correct answers. I feel one thing our division lacks is helping the Junior Defenders grow. I feel that the Junior Defenders would be assigned as co counsel on a case and at times, the primary would take over all of the work, have a junior defender look over it, and send in the paperwork. While having the juniors look over work like this can be helpful, they still have no experience working on it themselves. Sitting down with the junior defender and showing them why we came up with a certain argument or why we are motioning to suppress certain evidence is necessary information that the junior defenders need to know if they want to move on to working cases by themselves.
- There was a case I had worked on that was challenging because it was difficult to speak with the defendant. Our availability never matched up and I wasn't about to get a client meeting with him. This made it difficult to paint a picture to the court of what had really happened on the day of my client's arrest. Along with this, the co-counsel on the case had decided to not respond to any emails and was inactive for the case. This was had made my case even more difficult as I was the only person to create, revise and edit my final case argument. Since we were never able to meet before the case, I had built my case specifically on what the evidence lacked and argued how the evidence should not be enough to charge my client with his charges. In the end, my client had received payment for a charge that he shouldn't have received, but he had been found guilty on a second felony charge. Throughout all the hardships, I had done my best to make sure my client had the best possible representation he could have.
- A Chief Public Defender has many responsibilities and should present themselves as a respectable attorney. I believe that the Chief needs to be approachable and friendly. The Chief shouldn't be someone that the lower-ranking attorneys are intimidated by. This would make it difficult for the Junior Defenders to approach the Chief with any questions or concerns. I feel that the Chief also needs to be open-minded. All suggestions should be taken into consideration and never blown off. If the Chief doesn't take suggestions and just puts them off to the side, then the attorneys in the defense division would feel unheard which may lead to attorneys leaving to go to a private firm. Although the chief should be approachable, the chief should also be able to put his foot down when necessary. If there are cases being unclaimed, the chief should be the person who is able to assign these cases to others and make sure that the representation given is the best that an attorney can possibly give.
- I have been known as someone who loves to do paperwork. I currently hold a human resources position for Los Santos Customs and in the Judicial Branch, along with a human resources support position at the Department of Corrections. I also hold the position as the Human Resources Director for Plague Inc. I also own a consulting business where I create many contracts for purchases and agreements between companies. These positions rely on strong, structured paperwork. With my experience, I have no problems handling a copious amount of paperwork.
- My plans for the defense division not only will help out our current defense attorneys, but will show a promising future for the defense division as a whole. I would like to recreate/reorganize the paperwork in the defense handbook. A lot of the information is great, but I feel that there are some things missing such as the correct payment for each attorney. I also feel the way that defense attorneys receive promotions should be changed. Previously, our chief wouldn't count the cases you had been in but would just go off of how much time you had been in the division. The previous chief didn't really work off of the promotional guide which I feel could be changed. The entire bulletin board for the defense division could use some more information and organization. Along with this I feel that there should be more incentives for the defense attorneys. When it comes to "Defense Attorney of the Month", there were no incentives to strive for that goal. There currently is no rewards when you achieve the attorney of the month and I feel this should be changed. This could make the defense attorneys strive for this goal and work hard when completing cases. Lastly, recruiting is a MUST. Our numbers for the defense attorney division is now running low, so I feel that flyers should be put up around the city along with keeping up on LifeInvader posts. A thought I had is to do walk-in interviews, I understand this is more of an Human Resources plus high command event, but I feel this would be good to gain numbers in our department.
