Federal legal office filled

• By BILL LODGE
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Aug 17, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Twitter
• Social Media

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

Mark Upton moved into the federal public defender’s office in Baton Rouge last week.

If his face seems familiar, it should: He has been a trial lawyer here since graduating from LSU’s law school in 1981.

“We were lucky to get Mark,” said Rebecca Hudsmith, federal public defender in charge of both the giant Western District of Louisiana and the much smaller Middle District.

That smaller district comprises East Baton Rouge and eight adjacent parishes. The Western District covers 43 parishes west of the Mississippi River.

Most of Upton’s work will be done in the federal courts of Baton Rouge, she said.

“We needed someone who could hit the ground running,” Hudsmith said. “He’s the guy.”

Hudsmith is based in Lafayette, but her assistant federal public defenders routinely handle cases in Lake Charles, Alexandria, Monroe and Shreveport, as well as Baton Rouge.

“We’re on the road all the time,” she said.

Upton, 57, said he welcomes the opportunity to run the Baton Rouge office.

He expressed his basic philosophy for that office: Society should pay for excellent defense of poor people accused of crimes.

When a defendant is guilty, Upton said, that rule should not be relaxed.

“I think it’s a measure of our values that we provide even the worst among us with the best possible defense,” he said. “Everyone is entitled to the benefits of the Constitution and the criminal justice system.”

When he was in private practice, Upton said, he sometimes was able to win acquittals for defendants he believed to be innocent.