Public defender: We won't pay for private attorneys

County prosecutors and judges are discounting a recent decision by the Maryland Office of the Public Defender to no longer pay for private attorneys to represent some indigent clients.

While their counterparts in other counties fear the new policy will lead the state's criminal justice system to grind to a halt, judicial insiders in Anne Arundel County say the public defender will have to find a way to represent those defendants.

"I fully expect the Office of the Public Defender to comply with the law when they appear in my courtroom," said Circuit Court Judge William C. Mulford II, one of the county judges who...