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My sister is a lawyer who works with poor clients with criminal cases (though not a defense attorney). She believes strongly that most people are better off wit

My sister is a lawyer who works with poor clients with criminal cases (though not a defense attorney). She believes strongly that most people are better off with their public defender than with private council. I asked her if she could square this with the general perception that the criminal justice system is stacked for with wealthy, she answered that the, most of the time, the connections matter more than the actual money. There are a lot of bad private lawyers out there, and it's hard for most people to tell them apart from the good ones. For a lot of us here, if we suddenly need a lawyer, then we'll ask our friends and family to help us find a good one. But if you don't know anybody who knows anybody who knows a lawyer, what do you do? Look at online reviews? If I were freaked out about criminal charges, needed a lawyer now, and didn't have my connections, it'd be up to blind luck. That's the reality for most criminal defendants. They'll hire private council and think that because they're paying for it, it's better. But it's often not. For a typical defendant with an aggravated assault charge, a public defender has handled dozens of similar cases before. Moreover, they'll have done it with your judge and your prosecutor. A private lawyer probably won't have that. Granted, this probably holds a lot less for the HN comments section. I'll add that there is no right to defense council for civil cases. These can have consequences just as dire as a criminal case, as in immigration or eviction proceedings. An indigent defendant with no lawyer has a very poor chance. There's a movement to create this right [1]. The current Supreme Court, however, seems more likely to weaken Gideon v. Wainwright than expand it.

roywiggins 7y ago
Federal public defenders have a very good reputation. State public defenders, less so. Mostly because many public defenders offices are deeply underfunded.
irjustin 7y ago
This is very insightful and makes a ton of sense. I'm not related to the company, but this is exactly what avvo.com is solving. I have known others to use it for traffic infractions all the way to criminal defence. In general they speak positively about the experience. I don't know any particular lawyer's connections, but I can see the reviews/self-reported-track records. But, this creates a new problem - gamification of reviews. But now that it's in the "reviews" space, I know how to at least manage that problem as opposed to something I know zero about such as judging a lawyer's relationships and effectiveness.
berberous 7y ago
Finding a good lawyer is hard, but to your point about public defenders having more relevant experience, there’s a simple heuristic: ask the lawyers you interview what direct experience they have. If you have an aggravated assault charge, and your potential private lawyer has done many DUIs but only one of those, move on. A public defender might not be _bad_, but in many jurisdictions they are egregiously overworked. Their case load is so over burdened they don’t have the time to do a thorough job. I’d much rather take my chances with a paid lawyer.
rflrob 7y ago
Though one’s right to a public defender only applies once you’ve been charged, right? In TFA, the guy being investigated was only the subject of a warrant.
- desdiv 7y ago
  I believe you have the right to a public defender during questioning (which can happen both before and after you are charged) based on the wording of the Miranda warning: >You have the right to have a lawyer with you during questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you before any questioning if you wish. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_warning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_warning
sfkdjf9j3j 7y ago
I think this post has a big misconception in it. Public defenders are for the destitute. You have to ask for one, and convince a judge that based on your assets and income, you can't afford a private attorney. There's no choice here, if you can afford a private defense, you won't be given a public defender.
- bryanrasmussen 7y ago
  I think this depends on the state, I think in a lot of states getting a public defender is just based on the Judge saying that in the case you cannot afford a lawyer one will be appointed for you and then asking if you need a lawyer appointed. Sure, if you're Bill Gates and you say yes, he might shut that down but the average person I don't think most jurisdictions actually investigate their means.
  - anfilt 7y ago
    I am not a lawyer, but if you have the means and say you don't I am pretty sure thats perjury.
    - bryanrasmussen 7y ago
      Ok, but I'm pretty sure that perjury is generally understood as being under oath and you aren't under oath when the judge is first reading you the charges against you and offering you the recourse of a public defender. Although I suppose the court could hold you in contempt if it found you had the means and said you didn't. But I've never seen or heard of anyone being means checked.
      - 1123581321 7y ago
        Is your comment based on experience? It seems wrong. All the search results (Findlaw, Avvo lawyer answers, etc) seem to be saying that you have to qualify financially, you have to submit your income and assets of your household under penalty of perjury (signed statement, not oath) and you may also be asked to get quotes from lawyers to compare against your means. I think the most you could say is that courts are so overloaded you might get away with perjury. A few sample links: https://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61781 https://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61781 https://www.newsherald.com/news/20180304/in-court-majority-seek-public-defenders-regardless-of-income https://www.newsherald.com/news/20180304/in-court-majority-s... https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/can-i-be-denied-a-public-defender--46821.html https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/can-i-be-denied-a-public-... http://gapubdef.org/index.php/faqs http://gapubdef.org/index.php/faqs
bryanrasmussen 7y ago
Ok, but having a public defender because you've been accused of burglarizing a house because you drove by it on your bike and google tracked the trip might not be that good since the public defender is generally focused on cutting a deal. Getting a deal cut with a public defender might be better than private but going to court under these specific circumstances?
samstave 7y ago
Obviously - people with money have far better connections.
ALittleLight 7y ago
Responding to the point about what you are supposed to do if you need a lawyer and don't know any - I needed a lawyer once and didn't know any. I first read about what I was accused of, I read the relevant parts of the law I was accused of violating, and then I googled and read whatever I could about the crime. I then looked up local lawyers and read their websites and bios and googled them to see if there was anything to read about them. Background research done I created a list of lawyers I wanted to talk to and called them one by one and discussed the case over the phone. The crime I was accused of was somewhat rare and none of the five lawyers I called were familiar with it. I could tell fairly quickly that several of the lawyers were, for lack of a better term, bullshitting me about their familiarity with crime because I had first done the basic research so I had some understanding of what was reasonable to say about it. One lawyer was obviously reading passages from wikipedia verbatim to me, which I recognized having recently read the same wikipedia article myself. Another lawyer didn't seem to listen to me - after hearing my story he confidently assured me he could get the charge reduced... to what I was already charged with. Others just didn't seem that competent. The lawyer I ultimately went with was a former prosecutor, which I liked because I figured it meant he would know the other prosecutors, and he was the only one who, when I called him, said "I don't know much about this. Let me do some reading and call you back." I immensely respected that more than the people who tried to pretend like they knew what they were talking about. Ultimately, we had an extremely successful result and now if anyone I know ever needs a lawyer, I have one to recommend. It may be a bit harder if you don't have connections, but there is no reason why the average person retaining a lawyer can't go through the effort of finding one they are comfortable with.
- jackpirate 7y ago
  there is no reason why the average person retaining a lawyer can't go through the effort of finding one they are comfortable with. You are vastly overestimating the ability of an "average" person to be able to understand and analyze legal complications for themselves. The average person, for example, does not have a college degree [1], let alone a degree in a technical subject that has trained them in analytic reasoning. [1] Only 37% of people age 25-30 in the US have a bachelors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_...
tingletech 7y ago
if you have money, is a public defender even an option?
scarface74 7y ago
I can’t disagree with this more. Public Defenders are overworked and underfunded. They have a high case load and are usually just interested in getting their clients to plea. Why would I put my life in the hands of someone paid by the same government trying to convict me if I could afford a private attorney?
closeparen 7y ago
I think the typical concern is that caseload usually doesn't permit a public defender to mount a defense, only to negotiate a plea agreement. Those connections will be useful in negotiation. But you are probably not getting evidence thrown out, private investigators, expert witnesses, etc.
hypersoar 7y ago
I did a bit of digging and found some (old) data to (largely) back me up! The Bureau of Justice Statistics released a report in 2000 [2] on "Defense Counsel in Criminal Cases". The following points are for defendants in state court in the 75 largest counties. The report has data for Federal defendants, too, and the broader picture looks pretty similar for them. According to the report, only 5% of criminal cases are in Federal courts. - Felony defendants were represented by publicly-financed attorneys over 80%(!) of the time. - Defendants with public and private attorneys had similar conviction rates. They pled out at similar rates, too. - Defendants with public attorneys were more likely to get prison sentences, but got shorter sentences on average. - Defendants with private attorneys who were already in prison (i.e., convicted) talked to their lawyers earlier and more often. The part about prison just seems to be because that's where they collected the data. - Defendants with public attorneys got pretrial release a lot less often (50% vs 80%) than those with private attorneys. This looks to me like it's mostly about not being able to afford bail. - Workloads for Federal appointed attorneys rose faster than spending on them. I would guess the same to be true of state courts and for the trend to have continued to today. [1] http://civilrighttocounsel.org/ http://civilrighttocounsel.org/, the civil right to counsel I forgot in my post. [2] https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dccc.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dccc.pdf 2000 appears to be the most recent report on this subject. It's possible they've collected more recent data elsewhere and I didn't turn it up.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I hate to point out the obvious, but you can't say anything meaningful about the effectiveness of lawyers without separating their clients into the ones that were guilty and the ones that weren't. It's very probably a wrong assumption that public and private lawyers have the same percentage split. And if the system actually worked, then a good lawyer shouldn't affect the conviction rate of the guilty...
  - imtringued 7y ago
    A convict might be guilty of a lesser crime than he was charged with.
6gvONxR4sf7o 7y ago
>There are a lot of bad private lawyers out there, and it's hard for most people to tell them apart from the good ones. Is that not the case for public defenders too?

roywiggins 7y ago

Federal public defenders have a very good reputation. State public defenders, less so. Mostly because many public defenders offices are deeply underfunded.

irjustin 7y ago

This is very insightful and makes a ton of sense. I'm not related to the company, but this is exactly what avvo.com is solving. I have known others to use it for traffic infractions all the way to criminal defence. In general they speak positively about the experience. I don't know any particular lawyer's connections, but I can see the reviews/self-reported-track records. But, this creates a new problem - gamification of reviews. But now that it's in the "reviews" space, I know how to at least manage that problem as opposed to something I know zero about such as judging a lawyer's relationships and effectiveness.

berberous 7y ago

Finding a good lawyer is hard, but to your point about public defenders having more relevant experience, there’s a simple heuristic: ask the lawyers you interview what direct experience they have. If you have an aggravated assault charge, and your potential private lawyer has done many DUIs but only one of those, move on. A public defender might not be _bad_, but in many jurisdictions they are egregiously overworked. Their case load is so over burdened they don’t have the time to do a thorough job. I’d much rather take my chances with a paid lawyer.

rflrob 7y ago

Though one’s right to a public defender only applies once you’ve been charged, right? In TFA, the guy being investigated was only the subject of a warrant.

desdiv 7y ago
I believe you have the right to a public defender during questioning (which can happen both before and after you are charged) based on the wording of the Miranda warning: >You have the right to have a lawyer with you during questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you before any questioning if you wish. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_warning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda_warning

sfkdjf9j3j 7y ago

I think this post has a big misconception in it. Public defenders are for the destitute. You have to ask for one, and convince a judge that based on your assets and income, you can't afford a private attorney. There's no choice here, if you can afford a private defense, you won't be given a public defender.

bryanrasmussen 7y ago
I think this depends on the state, I think in a lot of states getting a public defender is just based on the Judge saying that in the case you cannot afford a lawyer one will be appointed for you and then asking if you need a lawyer appointed. Sure, if you're Bill Gates and you say yes, he might shut that down but the average person I don't think most jurisdictions actually investigate their means.
- anfilt 7y ago
  I am not a lawyer, but if you have the means and say you don't I am pretty sure thats perjury.
  - bryanrasmussen 7y ago
    Ok, but I'm pretty sure that perjury is generally understood as being under oath and you aren't under oath when the judge is first reading you the charges against you and offering you the recourse of a public defender. Although I suppose the court could hold you in contempt if it found you had the means and said you didn't. But I've never seen or heard of anyone being means checked.
    - 1123581321 7y ago
      Is your comment based on experience? It seems wrong. All the search results (Findlaw, Avvo lawyer answers, etc) seem to be saying that you have to qualify financially, you have to submit your income and assets of your household under penalty of perjury (signed statement, not oath) and you may also be asked to get quotes from lawyers to compare against your means. I think the most you could say is that courts are so overloaded you might get away with perjury. A few sample links: https://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61781 https://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61781 https://www.newsherald.com/news/20180304/in-court-majority-seek-public-defenders-regardless-of-income https://www.newsherald.com/news/20180304/in-court-majority-s... https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/can-i-be-denied-a-public-defender--46821.html https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/can-i-be-denied-a-public-... http://gapubdef.org/index.php/faqs http://gapubdef.org/index.php/faqs

bryanrasmussen 7y ago

Ok, but having a public defender because you've been accused of burglarizing a house because you drove by it on your bike and google tracked the trip might not be that good since the public defender is generally focused on cutting a deal. Getting a deal cut with a public defender might be better than private but going to court under these specific circumstances?

samstave 7y ago

Obviously - people with money have far better connections.

ALittleLight 7y ago

Responding to the point about what you are supposed to do if you need a lawyer and don't know any - I needed a lawyer once and didn't know any. I first read about what I was accused of, I read the relevant parts of the law I was accused of violating, and then I googled and read whatever I could about the crime. I then looked up local lawyers and read their websites and bios and googled them to see if there was anything to read about them. Background research done I created a list of lawyers I wanted to talk to and called them one by one and discussed the case over the phone. The crime I was accused of was somewhat rare and none of the five lawyers I called were familiar with it. I could tell fairly quickly that several of the lawyers were, for lack of a better term, bullshitting me about their familiarity with crime because I had first done the basic research so I had some understanding of what was reasonable to say about it. One lawyer was obviously reading passages from wikipedia verbatim to me, which I recognized having recently read the same wikipedia article myself. Another lawyer didn't seem to listen to me - after hearing my story he confidently assured me he could get the charge reduced... to what I was already charged with. Others just didn't seem that competent. The lawyer I ultimately went with was a former prosecutor, which I liked because I figured it meant he would know the other prosecutors, and he was the only one who, when I called him, said "I don't know much about this. Let me do some reading and call you back." I immensely respected that more than the people who tried to pretend like they knew what they were talking about. Ultimately, we had an extremely successful result and now if anyone I know ever needs a lawyer, I have one to recommend. It may be a bit harder if you don't have connections, but there is no reason why the average person retaining a lawyer can't go through the effort of finding one they are comfortable with.

jackpirate 7y ago
there is no reason why the average person retaining a lawyer can't go through the effort of finding one they are comfortable with. You are vastly overestimating the ability of an "average" person to be able to understand and analyze legal complications for themselves. The average person, for example, does not have a college degree [1], let alone a degree in a technical subject that has trained them in analytic reasoning. [1] Only 37% of people age 25-30 in the US have a bachelors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_...

tingletech 7y ago

if you have money, is a public defender even an option?

scarface74 7y ago

I can’t disagree with this more. Public Defenders are overworked and underfunded. They have a high case load and are usually just interested in getting their clients to plea. Why would I put my life in the hands of someone paid by the same government trying to convict me if I could afford a private attorney?

closeparen 7y ago

I think the typical concern is that caseload usually doesn't permit a public defender to mount a defense, only to negotiate a plea agreement. Those connections will be useful in negotiation. But you are probably not getting evidence thrown out, private investigators, expert witnesses, etc.

hypersoar 7y ago

I did a bit of digging and found some (old) data to (largely) back me up! The Bureau of Justice Statistics released a report in 2000 [2] on "Defense Counsel in Criminal Cases". The following points are for defendants in state court in the 75 largest counties. The report has data for Federal defendants, too, and the broader picture looks pretty similar for them. According to the report, only 5% of criminal cases are in Federal courts. - Felony defendants were represented by publicly-financed attorneys over 80%(!) of the time. - Defendants with public and private attorneys had similar conviction rates. They pled out at similar rates, too. - Defendants with public attorneys were more likely to get prison sentences, but got shorter sentences on average. - Defendants with private attorneys who were already in prison (i.e., convicted) talked to their lawyers earlier and more often. The part about prison just seems to be because that's where they collected the data. - Defendants with public attorneys got pretrial release a lot less often (50% vs 80%) than those with private attorneys. This looks to me like it's mostly about not being able to afford bail. - Workloads for Federal appointed attorneys rose faster than spending on them. I would guess the same to be true of state courts and for the trend to have continued to today. [1] http://civilrighttocounsel.org/ http://civilrighttocounsel.org/, the civil right to counsel I forgot in my post. [2] https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dccc.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dccc.pdf 2000 appears to be the most recent report on this subject. It's possible they've collected more recent data elsewhere and I didn't turn it up.

perl4ever 7y ago
I hate to point out the obvious, but you can't say anything meaningful about the effectiveness of lawyers without separating their clients into the ones that were guilty and the ones that weren't. It's very probably a wrong assumption that public and private lawyers have the same percentage split. And if the system actually worked, then a good lawyer shouldn't affect the conviction rate of the guilty...
- imtringued 7y ago
  A convict might be guilty of a lesser crime than he was charged with.

6gvONxR4sf7o 7y ago

>There are a lot of bad private lawyers out there, and it's hard for most people to tell them apart from the good ones. Is that not the case for public defenders too?