{"id":13280,"date":"2018-02-01T17:02:46","date_gmt":"2018-02-01T23:02:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/?p=13280"},"modified":"2018-02-07T09:45:52","modified_gmt":"2018-02-07T15:45:52","slug":"brandt-devich-16-wins-case-over-clients-jail-fees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/2018\/02\/01\/brandt-devich-16-wins-case-over-clients-jail-fees\/","title":{"rendered":"Brandt Devich ’16 wins case over client’s jail fees"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brandt Devich \u201916<\/strong> felt so strongly about the case he was assigned in Mitchell Hamline\u2019s Legal Assistance to Minnesota Prisoners (LAMP) clinic<\/a>, he kept working on it even after he graduated. The best part\u2014he won.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just a great experience,\u201d Devich said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t think of a better way to learn and hit the ground running.\u201d<\/p>\n

Devich worked with Professor Bradford Colbert \u201985 (WMCL) <\/strong>to represent a man who was charged $25 a day while he was locked up in Martin County Jail in southern Minnesota. In the end, his bill for being incarcerated on four separate occasions in 2013 and 2014 totaled $7,625.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It\u2019s called \u201cpay to stay,\u201d and under Minnesota statute<\/a> it\u2019s something counties are allowed to do to recover money spent on \u201croom, board, clothing, medical, dental and other correctional services.\u201d But the law also stipulates that sheriffs should waive the bill if the person can\u2019t afford to pay.<\/p>\n

The man in the Martin County case contended he couldn\u2019t pay the bill, something he said the Martin County sheriff\u2019s office didn\u2019t consider before turning the charge over to a collection agency. He contacted Colbert and asked for his help through the LAMP clinic.<\/p>\n

Colbert worked with Devich, a law student at the time, to file a lawsuit in an effort to show the man couldn\u2019t afford the \u201cpay-to-stay\u201d bill.<\/p>\n

Colbert says the case, which went from state district court to federal court, gave Devich the opportunity to do the work of an attorney.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe worked really hard on it,\u201d he said. \u201cHe was the contact person for our client, he did the initial draft of the complaint, and we worked hard on the summary judgment together.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201dIt was a lot of pressure,\u201d Devich said of the case, which he worked on for about two years. \u201cI did a lot of leg work interacting with the client and interacting with the opposing counsel. Professor Colbert told me what needs to happen, how I need to do things, and what good arguments are\u2014I was able to stand up to the experienced attorney who has tons of cases like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Devich, who graduated from Mitchell Hamline in the spring of 2016, kept on the case after he graduated, even as he began work doing freelance contract review.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw an opportunity that was probably more experience than I\u2019ll get anywhere else,\u201d he said. \u201cI just wanted to stick with it to see where it went. I felt pretty strongly that we were right, and it turns out we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Devich\u2019s work paid off Jan. 17 when U.S. District Court Chief Judge John Tunheim ruled in the plaintiff\u2019s favor<\/a>. The judgment found the Martin County sheriff violated state law by not considering whether the man could afford to pay for his stay in jail, and it ordered the sheriff\u2019s office to develop a procedure to determine whether inmates can pay.<\/p>\n

Devich says he was speechless when he found out he won. The experience has left him with an appreciation for the work he was able to do in LAMP and in several other of Mitchell Hamline\u2019s 13 clinics<\/a>. He says it gave him experience in a real courtroom and also had a huge effect on the life of his client.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s great to be able to have this debt that was hanging over his head erased.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brandt Devich \u201916 felt so strongly about the case he was assigned in Mitchell Hamline\u2019s Legal Assistance to Minnesota Prisoners (LAMP) clinic, he kept working on it even after he graduated. The best part\u2014he won. \u201cIt was just a great experience,\u201d Devich said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t think of a better way to learn and hit the … <\/p>\n

Brandt Devich ’16 wins case over client’s jail fees<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4909,"featured_media":13285,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-13280","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-features","8":"category-news","9":"entry"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4909"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13280\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mitchellhamline.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}