Client Choice for Indigent Criminal Defendants: Theory and Implementation

With rare exceptions, existing systems for effectuating the indigent criminal defendant’s right to counsel 2 range from disappointing to scandalously inadequate. 3 Inadequate funding is the most prominently mentioned concern, but often it is merely a symptom of a deeper problem of institutional structure, an Achilles’ heel that weakens almost all indigent defense systems, whether poorly funded or not. For financial resources and other essentials, counsel for the indigent— including public defenders, appointed private counsel and lawyers who serve under the “contract” system—are typically beholden to the agency of government (in most cases local government) that foots the bill, 4 to court administrators or even to