‘In the criminal justice system,” as every Law & Order devotee knows, “there are two separate yet equally important groups: the police who investigate crime, and the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders.”

Not so fast.

The Constitution and the Supreme Court insist that a third entity is required in the mix: the defense. And since the Constitution doesn’t promise due process only to those who can afford it, the criminal justice system also includes the public defenders.

In Spokane County, like a lot of other places, public defenders are staggering under caseloads that strain their ability to represent all their clients effectively.

On average, the lawyers who handle felonies in Public Defender John Rodgers’ office carry 175 cases. The American Bar Association says it’s unethical to have more than 150.

The ABA says 300 misdemeanor cases should be the limit for one public defender, yet lawyers who work for Rodgers have more than twice as many.

Those patterns are unsustainable. In time, courts may order corrective action or start overturning convictions – or both.

Spokane County Commissioners are now considering an ordinance that would limit caseloads of both public defenders and the private-sector lawyers who help lighten the load at public expense. Such an ordinance is the price Spokane County must pay for Rodgers’ office to receive nearly $390,000 from the state Office of Public Defense.

While the grant will defray the cost of lowering caseloads, it will only forestall the implicit increases – for more lawyers, more support staff, more office space and supplies.

Another promising move is afoot, however, one that would lower caseloads by reducing cases themselves. The Prosecuting Attorney’s Office wants to resume a “restorative justice” program that was shelved in 2004. By taking low-level traffic cases out of the main court system, according to Rodgers, that strategy could remove about a third of the public defenders’ misdemeanor caseload.

What’s more, it’s a common-sense solution to a self-compounding problem involving motorists who are caught driving with a suspended license. Without a license, they can’t get to work. If they don’t work, they can’t pay their fines. If they don’t pay their fines they can’t get their license back. And when and if they drive with a suspended license, the taxpayers incur the cost of arresting and jailing them. There’s no way out.

But between 1998 and 2003, the Community Re-Licensing Program, offered hope. It gave offenders an affordable payment plan to cover their obligations, coupled with training in money management, car care and job hunting. City Prosecutor Howard Delaney once called it a “win-win,” but city and county budget cuts doomed it, and hundreds of cases returned to the public defenders’ caseloads.

Resurrecting the program now appears to hinge on whether the Spokane City Council will contribute its share of the cost next year. And perhaps the city of Spokane Valley.

In fact, there’s a fourth separate but equally important group with a role to play in the criminal justice system – local elected officials.