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Indigent Defense in Maryland

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"Cash-strapped Maryland public defender office ends contracts with private attorneys," is the National Law Journal web-only report by Marcia Coyle.The Maryland Office of Public Defender recently announced it will no longer contract with private attorneys to handle an estimated 10,000 cases annually in which it has conflicts because the office has no money to pay them. The policy change takes effect this week, according to the office's spokeswoman, Kimberlee Schultz. "We've gone to the [state] Department of Budget and Management several times over the past few months and explained that we are in a difficult situation and underfunded," she said. "We've pretty much exhausted that avenue." The office handles about 200,000 cases per year, of which about 5%, or 10,000, involve indigent defendants referred to private attorneys when there is a conflict in their cases...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on September 30, 2008 (boomark / email).