News Archive
Welcome!
Jan 06, 2006
Welcome to AACJ's new website! One of the goals of our organization has long been to provide members with more value-things they could see and use immediately in their practices. In this e-world, a current, interactive, and useful site is imperative to keep abreast of developments important to defenders. The new website is being designed toward that end.
We will keep a number of significant practice aids and updates on this site that members will want to check out regularly. Besides the usual notifications of seminars, membership information, Board and Officer's contact info, and our calendar, we will have a comprehensive Document Library that could be a boon to any member's practice. Available documents will include pattern pleadings and forms, substantive legal memoranda and other materials of interest to our members. We will be posting our Amicus briefs here as well. We plan to collect transcripts of the testimony of expert witnesses and law enforcement officers and agents, as well as of proceedings involving conduct of prosecutors. While our thanks go out to the Maricopa County Public Defender's Office for seeding the field with lots of pattern pleadings and other documents to help us get started, the seeds will not flower without your help. The success of the Library depends entirely on your future contributions to it. The Document Library is available to members of AACJ only.
You will be interested in the Legislative Update section where our Legislative Committee will post information on pending bills of interest to us, as well as how-to directions for identifying who your legislators are and how to contact them. But other committees will have pages you can turn to for a quick review of the status of their many projects as well. The Amicus/Strike Force Committee will provide you with summaries of amicus projects we are working on or which have been completed. Some projects are substantial, like the Darendahl litigation, and you will be able to get the latest scoop on those issues there. Our Indigent Defense Committee has recently undertaken improving jail conditions as well as the contract systems for appointed counsel, and is looking into continuity of counsel for capital defendants.
We hope you will participate in the AACJ Forum, another Members Only feature that will allow our members to keep in touch with each other and keep abreast of current developments in their areas of interest. The Forum is a Bulletin Board System (BBS) that will allow you to share ideas and information without filling your email box with hundreds of communications in which you have little interest. The Forum is divided into several interest and practice areas and will let you zero in on what you want with minimal hassle. There are areas there where you can tell us how we're doing in giving you the bang you want for your buck. There is even a place for idle chatter. You will soon be able to join AACJ, or renew your membership, right here on line. You will also be able to register for seminars. After the seminar, you can tell us what you thought about it, or discuss suggestions for future seminars, in the Forum.
To be sure, this is an ambitious project. The site is far from complete. We wanted to give you as much of it as we can so we can start getting your comments before the design team shuffles off to Buffalo. The AACJ website can be a gold mine for our members, but we can only keep its edge with the help of your feedback. Let us know what in this site works well for you, what doesn't work, and what else you think would be helpful. You can do it in the Forum, and perhaps stimulate those who agree or disagree to join in the discussion, or by using the Contact AACJ link found on the site. The website is a "work in progress" that we will be augmenting and revising to keep it as relevant and valuable to you as possible. Don't forget: when you get information or news relevant to members, share it by sending it to us to post on the website; when you get transcripts usable by fellow defenders, spread the love the same way.
And if you're not a member, you are really missing out on these terrific opportunities, resources, and information that members get through the AACJ website. Join today. A great defense is worth the investment.