AREA PUBLIC DEFENDER MOVING ON

By moving to Springfield, Mo., attorney Kent Hall claims to be following the advice of former baseball player Yogi Berra.

"His newest book is called, When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!'" Hall said. "That's exactly what I'm doing."

After about five years running the largest criminal defense service in Southeast Missouri, Hall is leaving the leadership of the Jackson, Mo., public defender's office for the same position in Springfield.

His supervisors in the state public defender's system asked him to consider the new job, Hall said.

"They have high turnover of attorneys in Springfield, which is leaving them mainly with attorneys having two years of experience or less," he said.

Developing the lawyers and others in the public defender's office here into a team is an accomplishment Hall hopes to replicate in Springfield.

Cape Girardeau County Judge William Syler is sorry to see Hall leaving, especially since he was partly responsible for bringing him here.

Syler had been on a short-term assignment as a judge in Jackson County when he met Hall, who impressed Syler enough that he talked with him about the leadership opening in the region's public defender's office.

"He has been very good for the morale of the people in his office," Syler said. "Most of the public defenders we see around here are fresh out of school, so he has been kind of a father figure to some of them."

Cape Girardeau prosecutor Morley Swingle said the region is losing one of its best criminal defense lawyers.

In 1999, Hall was recognized by the Missouri Bar Association as the top public defender in the state.

One of Hall's biggest regrets is that he is leaving just as a drug court for first-time offenders in Cape Girardeau, Bollinger and Perry counties is preparing to start next month.

"Primarily, I was the squeaky wheel for getting drug courts in our region," he said.

The state public defender's office should appoint a new attorney to replace him within two weeks, Hall said.