Maine’s Public Defender Problem
BANGOR — Legal experts say the state of Maine is facing a crisis that could destroy confidence in Maine’s judicial system.
The state of Maine’s judicial system is searching for a solution to the shortage of lawyers willing to take on public defender cases.
Recently the state began its first public defender program…But it only employs five lawyers for the entirety of Maine.
Meaning, the state is still heavily reliant on private attorneys being willing to take on cases.
Senator Lisa Keim of Dixfield says, “Right now we’re at a crisis with a lack of defenders to represent people that can not pay for a lawyer on their own”.
Up until recently, the state of Maine’s public defenders were all private attorneys hired on a case-by-case bases.
However, the number of lawyers willing to do that has been shrinking in past years.
Keim believes the decline of willing attorneys is due to the state not offering competitive wages.
She says private attorneys in the state are paid 200 to 250 dollars an hour as opposed to the state’s wage of just 80 dollars an hour.
“Given also the backlog in the courts, the complication that creates, this fee, this amount is nowhere near enough and we’re just- we’re losing them” says Keim.
According to Penobscot county’s district attorney Christopher Almy, the reason fewer and fewer lawyers are willing to help the state goes beyond just the pay.
Almy says, “The reason they’re diminishing is because pay is not that great but also I think that the organization that is in charge of the lawyers and what they do has started to put significant restrictions on how they practice law and how they handle these cases”.
According to Almy, the lack of public defenders has brought Maine’s court system to a near halt.
“Some lawyers have in fact filed motions for a speedy trial and asked the judges to rule that because you didn’t bring this case to court soon enough it should be dismissed,” says Almy.
Almy is concerned as to what may happen if a solution is not found soon and individuals are released because of Maine’s slowed court system.
He says, “If we have people being let out over and over and over again because they don’t have a lawyer or because we can’t get their case processed, those people who are let out in that manner realize, hey what have I got to lose? I’m not gonna go to court any time soon. It erodes confidence in the public process”.
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