Connecticut's top public defender faces termination over misconduct allegations

Connecticut's top public defender fought to keep her job Tuesday as an oversight commission began considering whether to fire her for a range of alleged misconduct, including hurling unfounded accusations of racism against people who disagreed with her and improperly accessing the emails of staff and the commission chairman.

Bowden-Lewis, 51, the first Black person to serve as the state's chief public defender, also suggested during sometimes contentious questioning that she was being treated differently than her predecessors. 'I was appointed in June 2022 to be the head and not the tail,' she told the commission. 'As chief, I am here to make decisions. Some decisions may not be popular, but they still must be made.' She added, 'If I have offended anyone, I do apologize.

In one of the first public signs of the acrimony between Bowden-Lewis and the commission, four of the panel's five members resigned early last year after Bowden-Lewis made allegations of racism and threated a lawsuit over the commission's rejection of her choice for human resources director, The Hartford Courant reported. One of Bowden-Lewis' supporters in attendance was Marilyn J. Ward Ford, a law professor at Quinnipiac University.

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