By Johanna Lacoe, Brett Fischer & Steven Raphael 

Objectives

Low-income individuals facing criminal charges experience disproportionately high rates of pretrial detention and conviction. We study a pilot program in Santa Clara County, CA that aims to address this inequity by providing access to public defenders immediately following arrest.

Methods

The Santa Clara Public Defender agreed to provide pilot services one day per week, rotating the intervention day across weeks. Individuals booked on an intervention day were eligible for early legal representation, while individuals booked on control days received public defender services as usual. The study leverages the rotating treatment day to compare pretrial release and case outcomes between eligible individuals booked on treatment days and eligible individuals booked on control days.

Results

Pilot program participants were 28 percentage points more likely to secure pretrial release, and 36 percentage points more likely to see their cases dismissed, relative to comparable individuals who generally first meet with their public defender at arraignment.

Conclusions

Providing prompt access to legal representation could improve release and case outcomes for low-income individuals and the efficacy of public defense.

Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 2024.

By Jacqueline Pacvilon, Neil Agarwal, Rosie Wang ,, April Pierina , Hernandez Luperdi

Having legal representation helps ensure due process and is associated with more positive case outcomes for people facing deportation. In 2022, the Midwest Immigrant Defenders Alliance (MIDA) was formed by four organizations to provide legal representation for people in the Chicago immigration court whose cases begin in immigration detention: The National Immigrant Justice Center, The Resurrection Project, The Immigration Project, and the Law Office of the Cook County Public Defender. These organizations developed a collaborative model to provide legal representation on a merits-blind basis, which ensures equity in access to representation. A larger share of people on the Chicago detained docket are being represented one year into the MIDA program, despite an increasing number of cases before the court. In this report, the Vera Institute of Justice evaluates the impact of MIDA and this model of universal representation during the coalition’s first year.

Key Takeaway:

Cases with representation have historically fared much better in immigration court. One year after MIDA’s formation, a larger share of people on the Chicago detained docket have representation, despite an increasing number of cases before the court. This model ensures equity and has resulted in many MIDA clients establishing a right to remain in the United States.

New York: Vera Institute of Justice, 2024. 35p.