What To Do When Your Public Defender Drops The Ball! Vincent W. Davis

 Social Work in Public Defense

Over the past two decades, the holistic movement for protection has evolved as an auspicious alternative to the conventional system. Instead of concentrating exclusively on criminal representation and court advocacy, the holistic defense approach aims to acknowledge the wider social issues underpinning criminal activity by discussing the root needs of clients in addition to their criminal defense. A lawyer alone can not sufficiently solve the types of issues that many public defense clients face – such as drug abuse, poverty, and homelessness. Therefore, one significant feature of the holistic model has been to include social workers within the public defense setting.

The use of social workers inside public defender offices, amid increasing interest, remains atypical and only available as limited resources allow. Indeed, the services available are minimal, often seriously, to assist the indigent with their criminal defenses. It is also necessary to decide if, and in what conditions, the costs of involving social workers in criminal defense generate proportionate gains, or whether resources can be diverted to alternative types of services or simply to the recruitment of more lawyers.

Working with Sarah Buchanan, Director of Social Services at the Community Law Office of Knox County Public Defender and others, the A2J Lab has developed a four-site randomized assessment that takes place in multiple Tennessee jurisdictions. The RCT examines whether results as part of the criminal defense team with a social worker are different from those where the accused are invited to take advantage of social workers in their neighborhoods.

Participants will be allocated to one of two conditions in a random way. The clients would be assigned a social worker from the public defender's office within the handled category. The social worker would collaborate with the lawyers and consumers individually to offer or coordinate social services. Clients in the control group will receive a pamphlet listing social workers in the neighborhood and programs that offer similar programs. Then the study team records findings over a multi-year period.

The research would show how effective the integration of a social worker into the criminal defense team is in minimizing recidivism as well as housing instability, unemployment, and other risk factors for potentially criminal behavior.

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