Public Defenders are facing soaring caseloads, and flatlining budgets, and with 80% of all criminal defendants in the US unable to afford a lawyer, the system is collapsing. With the Constitutional right to fair representation in a court of law in jeopardy, VICE’s Cord Jefferson heads to one of the worst-hit states to see how overworked and underpaid public defenders are grinding the legal system to a halt.

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