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Territorial Public Defender seeks $6.7 million for hires, security and digital case management
Summary
Chief territorial public defender Julie Smith Todman asked the Legislature’s budget committee for $6,696,220 for FY2026 to address caseload growth, digital evidence needs, IT migration and staff retention; the office said it now manages over 1,000 open cases territory‑wide and is digitizing records with a new case management system.
The Office of the Territorial Public Defender (OTPD) asked senators on July 15 to fund a $6,696,220 fiscal 2026 budget request aimed at hiring and retaining attorneys and support staff, improving digital evidence handling and cybersecurity, and expanding access to mental‑health and community supports.
Chief Territorial Public Defender Julie Smith Todman told the Committee on Budget, Appropriations and Finance that the OTPD currently manages 1,064 open cases across the territory as of June 30, 2025, and that case complexity is rising because prosecutors increasingly rely on large sets of digital evidence.
Todman described three main modernization efforts: (1) a new defender data case management system (Defender Data, or “DD”) that the office is using to centralize case information; (2) a discovery workflow and vendor plan (identified vendor: Redux) to handle large datasets and prepare evidence for experts; and (3) an IT migration and enhanced cybersecurity program that would add next‑generation…
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