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An appeals court Wednesday sided with the Florida Department of Corrections and blocked the Hillsborough County public defender’s office from representing an inmate in a dispute about the state collecting restitution.
A three-judge panel of the 2nd District Court of Appeal overturned a circuit judge’s decision to appoint the 13th Judicial Circuit public defender to represent inmate Nathaniel O’Neal, who is serving a life sentence for first-degree murder.
The dispute stemmed from the Department of Corrections seeking to collect restitution from O’Neal under a law that allows the state to recoup incarceration-related costs.
The department in 2022 filed a motion to impose what is known as a civil restitution lien, according to Wednesday’s ruling.
A circuit judge approved appointing the public defender’s office, which opposed the lien on O’Neal’s inmate trust account.
The public defender’s office contended such a “garnishment would make O’Neal’s punishment less bearable because he would be unable to make purchases from the canteen” and that it was in retaliation for O’Neal filing a federal civil-rights complaint against the department, Wednesday’s ruling said.
But the appeals court said O’Neal was not entitled to representation by the public defender’s office because the lien issue was a civil matter.
“The public defender is not authorized to represent O’Neal in this civil restitution lien proceeding because it is civil in nature and does not implicate O’Neal’s liberty interests,” the seven-page ruling by Judges Stevan Northcutt, Craig Villanti and Suzanne Labrit said. “Further, defending against the department’s efforts to obtain a civil restitution lien … does not invoke the due process concerns that justify the appointment of counsel in postconviction relief proceedings.”
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