Gideon's Promise Versus Gideon's Reality: Resource Shortfalls In Pennsylvania Public Defense

• In Event: Data in Indigent Defense: Resource Shortages and Solutions in Public Defense

Abstract

In September 2023, the RAND Corporation published a landmark study estimating the minimum time inputs required for public defenders to provide adequate representation that satisfies prevailing constitutional and professional standards in criminal cases. To calculate the implied minimum workload of public defender organizations in each Pennsylvania county, we applied these estimates to a dataset covering over 1 million criminal cases in Pennsylvania filed between 2016 and 2022 . Further, we compared this to actual staffing levels to identify areas with resource shortfalls. We find that shortfalls are pervasive but not universal--55 of the 66 counties with public defenders (83%) have criminal attorney staffing levels below current standards; however, there are counties that satisfy adequacy standards in all regions of the state and across all county population categories. A sensitivity analysis reveals that for 38 counties (58%), there are no plausible set of assumptions regarding time inputs that would yield a finding of adequate resourcing. These results raise important questions about the constitutional adequacy of Pennsylvania's current public defense system.

Author

• Paul Heaton, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School