Stay informed with PSLawNet’s weekly aggregation of public interest news stories from around the country.

• 1.8.10 – Albany Times-Union – Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, New York’s highest-ranking jurist, testified in front of the state legislature about the dire need for increased legal services funding.  While the state court system has already, in an unprecedented move, allocated $15 million to shore up funding, Lippman highlighted dramatic shortfalls in IOLA funding and noted that “[w]e cannot and will not stand idly by as legal services programs are forced to shut their doors, leaving our most vulnerable citizens without help in their time of greatest need.”  Link to article.  [Ed. Note: Additionally, the North Country Gazette reports that Jonathan E. Gradess, executive director of the New York State Defenders Association, expressed support at the hearings for bolstering civil legal services funding.  Interestingly, Gradess “also pointed out that calls for a ‘civil Gideon’…would be a ‘pyrrhic victory’ if modeled on the current implementation of…Gideon v. Wainwright.”  This likely reflects the view by many in the indigent defense community that Gideon’s promise has not been achieved because public defense programs are inadequately staffed and under-resourced.]

• 1.8.10 – Arizona Daily Star – in the wake of the Tucson City Council’s decision to slash the city budget by $25 million, the city prosecutor will lay off 3 of her office’s 38 attorneys.  The layoffs “will force the elimination of the Mental Health Court, a highly touted program devoted to keeping mentally ill people out of jail…[and] the elimination of the neighborhood prosecution team, which handles…neighborhood nuisance issues.”  The courthouse administrators and public defender’s office avoided layoffs.  Link to article.

• 1.5.10 – Daytona Beach News-Journal – Equal Justice Works Fellow Shelly Campbell is working to ensure that veterans who face substance abuse problems, homelessness, and psychological disorders are able to access the full range of benefits to which they are entitled.  Link to article.

• 1.5.10 – Metropolitan Corporate Counsel – as the Bay State’s civil legal services community continues to endure a severe funding crisis, on January 27^th the Massachusetts Bar Association “will again co-sponsor a Walk to the Hill for Civil Legal Aid to advocate for increased funding for civil legal services throughout the commonwealth.”  Link to article.

• 1.4.10 – National Law Journal – a closely watched case which challenged the principle of absolute prosecutorial immunity was dismissed by the Supreme Court after the parties agreed to a monetary settlement.  Link to article.  As was reported by the Washington Post when the case was argued at the Supreme Court last November, the court was to determine whether prosecutorial misconduct during the pre-trial, criminal investigation stage was protected by the same absolute immunity that prosecutors enjoy for conduct during trial.

• 1.3.10 –  St. Joseph News-Press (Missouri) [“Guest Column”] – a county prosecutor in Missouri questions the public defender resource “crisis” which was the subject of a recent state Supreme Court decision affecting whether the state’s public defender programs could refuse to take on new cases due to strains on resources.  Link to article.  [Ed Note: original News-Press coverage of the state high court’s decision is found here.]

• 1.3.10 – Detroit Free Press – in response to the rise in consumer-debt collection cases in Wayne County courts, the University of Detroit Mercy Law School has installed a Consumer Defense Clinic in one of the county’s district courts to “make court friendlier — and fairer — for defendants in debt collection cases.”  Link to article.

• 1.2.10 – New York Times [Op-ed] – the chief judges of California and New Hampshire see a need to address the swelling numbers of low- and middle-income pro se litigants who can not afford an attorney and who either don’t qualify for legal aid or are turned away by a provider due to insufficient resources.  Establishing a right to counsel in some civil matters – as has been done in California – is a “step forward,” but states should also look at the possibility of allowing attorneys to offer limited-scope representation to clients.  Link to Op-ed.

• 1.2.10 – Wichita Eagle – the Kansas Treatment Re-Entry Assistance Court (KAN-TRAC) is “one of about two dozen federal programs across the United States designed to help people stay out of prison once their sentence ends.”  KAN-TRAC, which has been operation for nine months, is staffed by a federal prosecutor, a public defender, substance abuse counselors, and others.  It is “aimed at ‘high risk’ offenders who are under 40, have significant histories of drug abuse and criminal activity with little education or employment history.”  Link to article.  [Ed. Note: more about the U.S. Department of Justice’s re-entry initiatives is found at http://www.reentry.gov/.]

• 1.1.10 – Washington Post – Republican attorneys general from 13 states wrote in a letter to the Senate and House leadership that a provision in the federal health care reform bill that “would shield Nebraska from the costs of expanding Medicaid programs” is “constitutionally flawed.”  The letter demanded that the provision not be included in the final legislation.  Link to article.

• January, 2010 – Young Lawyer [monthly newsletter of the ABA’s Young Lawyers Division] –  John Pollock, the ABA Section of Litigation’s Civil Right to Counsel Fellow, notes that Gideon’s Sixth Amendment promise of counsel for criminal defendants has not extended to litigants in civil matters, even when their liberty and welfare hang in the balance: “…in 1981 the Supreme Court held in Lassiter v. Dep’t of Social Services that there is a presumption against a due process right to appointed counsel in civil cases except where physical liberty (confinement) is at stake. Under Lassiter, even when confinement is a possibility in a civil case, a court must balance the strength of the litigant’s interest, the risk of error, and the state’s interest to determine whether it should appoint counsel.”  Link to article.  [Ed. Note: on the issue of a “civil Gideon,” last October the Wall Street Journal covered California’s move to provide a right to counsel for low-income litigants in some civil matters.]