DA Fani Willis immediately appeals disqualification from Trump RICO case to Georgia Supreme Court

[Ms. Toad]

14. Appeals are based on the record, not on new evidence.

That is one of the reasons that the public defender system means it is much more likely that criminal appeals will fail than succeed.

The public defender system generally compensates defense attorneys at a much lower rate than prosecuting attorneys. So an indigent defendant is often stuck with a less competent, higher caseload, less money to gather evidence attorney. When the evidence is gathered for trial, or the defense attorney doesn't put on a good defense (including, in some cases on the record sleeping through parts of the trial), there is no way to remedy it on appeal - because appeals are based on the record (everything presented or preserved at trial). If it isn't in the record, with extremely limited exceptions, it can't be introduced on appeal.