Leland A. Burton

When my ex-wife made up false domestic violence claims to attempt to gain the upper hand in her divorce Leland Burton was the public defender assigned to my case. I made it clear to Mr Burton that I was innocent and had proof. The Shelterhouse social workers who were supposed to be advocating for my ...wife as the "victim" told the prosecutor J Dee Brooks the will be advocating for me at trial as the victim of false allegations and a controlling wife. Shelterhouse went against their own policy of not representing anyone with pending criminal charges due to me having 100% exculpatory evidence. Burton told me he knew I was innocent, but I need to either take the plea deal or hire a private attorney if I go to trail. I did not have money to hire a private attorney. Prosecutor J Dee Brooks threatened to add two additional charges if I do not plea out. I had no prior record of any kind, not even a traffic violation. It appears Leland Burton was working for the prosecution, not the public. My wife told me she would go to jail for extortion and filing false charges if I took it to trial with the evidence I had. She said that since she was still breast feeding the best thing I can do for our daughter is plea out so our daughter isn't without breast milk. She promised to go to therapy and work on our marriage if I plead guilty. She then immediately filed for divorce after I plead guilty to a crime Burton and the prosecution knew I was innocent of. She tried you use my plea as ground to gain 100% custody of our daughter. I was able to prove my innocence to the court and get custody, but ultimately was forced to move out of the area my daughter lives in for fear her mother can make up false charges again in the future, and I will now have a first strike on record with the court, and could go to prison for another false allegation due to not having funds to properly represent myself again. If you are innocent don't go with Leland Burton. Let's be frank, he gets his pay from the very court that's charging you. He doesn't care about innocence and justice or defending the public. Shameful behavior for a supposed public defender.

At such a critical time in my life, I trusted and depended upon Mr. Burton for taking care of my expungement. He literally did nothing with my time-sensitive case, which began in January 2014. At first, he told me this process should take about 2-3 months. He seldomly returned my phone calls/emails a...nd I was always the one initiating contact. 4 months in, Mr. Burton still had not given me the go-ahead to get my fingerprints done, which is required to begin the application process. I had to ask if I need to get them done and what I needed to do with them. In my opinion, the attorney should be the one to tell me what I need to do and when, not the client. I was given a hearing date of June 18. After not hearing from Mr. Burton, the day before my hearing, I asked what time to meet, what to bring, what to say, etc. and 15 minutes before closing time he responds saying he made an error and the hearing was postponed until July 29. This was only hours before my "hearing". If I had not emailed him, I am confident I would have been stood up at the courthouse with no actual hearing. I have since retained a new attorney who, during the consultation hour, filed all paperwork and scheduled a new hearing because the July 29th date Mr. Burton gave me was also a farce. Turns out the copy of my fingerprints were never even sent in and the paperwork was never even filed. Mr. Burton still had my fingerprints which he was supposed to file with my expungement application seven months ago. I do not wish to write ill about Mr. Burton, but I would not grant this experience on my worst enemy. I had so much riding on this expungement- school, nursing licensure, starting a family, and he did nothing but waste 7 months of my time. This should have been over and done with in March but here I am, still waiting. I felt utterly betrayed by Mr. Burton and am extremely disappointed in the way he handled my case.