Type of Submission
Poster
Keywords
Qualitative, public defense, lawyer, motivations, perception, defense
Abstract
The right to an attorney is a one to which all U.S. citizens are entitled, in conjunction with the constitution's sixth amendment. Difficulty arose when people who were unable to provide necessary funds to hire a lawyer and, subsequently, went into trial pro se. Resolution was met with the creation of the public defense system -- a system which is unfortunately understudied, and sometimes regarded in a negative light, including a negative perception that public defense is a broken system. This belief sometimes bleeds into the minds of potential clients who may believe a public defender is not sufficiently competent to represent them. The present qualitative research study reports the perspectives of public defenders, from their own vantage points and perspectives. We interviewed 22 public defenders (Male = 13, Female = 9) from three counties in Southwest Ohio. The public defenders reflected on their respective viewpoints, from when they first started in this career path, with their current perspectives. In our initial findings, motivations for becoming a public defender seem to fall under one of three categories: a desire for justice and a strong belief in the Constitution, a desire to help people who are less fortunate, or a desire for a steady paycheck. While many positives came forth through in the interviews, struggles of the career of a public defender also seemed to appear. These include low pay and a small budget for cases, a lack of time for each case because of a heavy caseload, and the perception of incompetence and indifference that their clients come in with.
Campus Venue
Stevens Student Center
Location
Cedarville, OH
Start Date
4-20-2016 11:00 AM
End Date
4-20-2016 2:00 PM
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Included in
Criminology and Criminal Justice Commons, Defense and Security Studies Commons, Social Psychology Commons
Social Psychology of Public Defenders: A Qualitative Study
Cedarville, OH
The right to an attorney is a one to which all U.S. citizens are entitled, in conjunction with the constitution's sixth amendment. Difficulty arose when people who were unable to provide necessary funds to hire a lawyer and, subsequently, went into trial pro se. Resolution was met with the creation of the public defense system -- a system which is unfortunately understudied, and sometimes regarded in a negative light, including a negative perception that public defense is a broken system. This belief sometimes bleeds into the minds of potential clients who may believe a public defender is not sufficiently competent to represent them. The present qualitative research study reports the perspectives of public defenders, from their own vantage points and perspectives. We interviewed 22 public defenders (Male = 13, Female = 9) from three counties in Southwest Ohio. The public defenders reflected on their respective viewpoints, from when they first started in this career path, with their current perspectives. In our initial findings, motivations for becoming a public defender seem to fall under one of three categories: a desire for justice and a strong belief in the Constitution, a desire to help people who are less fortunate, or a desire for a steady paycheck. While many positives came forth through in the interviews, struggles of the career of a public defender also seemed to appear. These include low pay and a small budget for cases, a lack of time for each case because of a heavy caseload, and the perception of incompetence and indifference that their clients come in with.
