Supervisors Welcome New County Public Defender

RIVERSIDE -- The Riverside County Board of Supervisors today formally appointed a longtime county attorney to serve as the county's public defender.

Steve Harmon, 65, will begin his duties in the next few weeks. He was hired by county CEO Jay Orr in March, and the appointment was unanimously accepted today by the board, which also signed off on a $219,217 annual salary for the veteran defense lawyer.

Harmon was present but did not speak before the vote.

Around 50 people competed for the job. The county began looking for a qualified candidate after the Nov. 7 departure of then-Riverside County Public Defender Gary Windom, who had been in the post since 1999, leaving amid allegations of internal conflicts.

Assistant Public Defender Brian Boles has served as interim public defender since Windom left.

Harmon will manage an office with a roughly $33 million annual budget and 225 employees.

He became a criminal defense attorney in 1972. In 2002, he and associate Paul Grech formed Criminal Defense Lawyers Inc. and won an indigent defense contract with the county. Under the agreement, CDL picks up felony and misdemeanor cases in which the Office of the Public Defender declares a conflict.

CDL handled indigent defense cases in the entire western county region until 2011, when the contracts were divvied up following criticism about how they had been awarded.