Investigation: Chief Public Defender “would often bully or marginalize employees who she did not favor or who questioned her in any way.” Resource allocated by loyalty.

Another grim day for the state’s public defender agency. An investigation of complaints by a current employee and a former one paints a troubling picture of life in the Division of Public Defender Services. The investigation, conducted by the Shipman & Goodwin law firm, “revealed serious, specific concerns, consistently stated by several witnesses, pertaining to [Chief Public Defender] TaShun Bowden Lewis’ management style, allocation of resources, and general treatment of fellow employees and Commission members,” Daily Ructions has learned.

The report, commissioned early this year by the Public Defender Services Commission, found in interviews conducted between March 6, 2023 and October 4, 2023, that “Ms. Bowden-Lewis would often bully or marginalize employees who she did not favor or who questioned her in any way.” It continues, “Indeed, on several occasions, we determined that if an employee was viewed as ‘disloyal’ or on her ‘bad side,’ Ms. Bowden-Lewis would take steps to ensure that the employee remained that way.”

Though the report verifies astonishing behavior, it concludes that it did not arise to the level of “discrimination, harassment, or an illegal ‘hostile work environment’ under the applicable Connecticut or federal statues.”

Investigators did determine “that Bowden-Lewis has made decisions about the distribution of resources in various offices at least in part based on perceived loyalty to her, and has denied resources to office heads who questioned Ms. Bowden-Lewis’s decisions.” This conclusion will do the most serious and lasting damage to the reputation of the agency and the confidence of its thousands of indigent clients.

The investigation also concludes that some of Bowden-Lewis’s denial of additional attorneys to several offices that requested them “was also fueled by her desire to save the funding from those positions for the new Public Relations unit that she has pushed to create….”

The December 1st report, provide to the commission 4 days before its December meeting, addresses only two complaints, filed by employees before all but one of the members of the Commission resigned in March and were replaced shortly after by members now serving. The Commission’s current members have endured considerable conflict with Bowden-Lewis.

The Division of Public Defender Services does have a new logo, a top Bowden-Lewis priority.

Updates as events require.

Published December 15, 2023.

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