“I’m retained on this one.”

Numerous times during my career as your local prosecutor, defense attorneys approached me about settling their clients’ cases and opened the conversation with that sentence. 

At the time, I had never handled any criminal defense, so I didn’t understand why they said that.  I thought it had something to do with how much of a break I should cut the defendant.  As in, “You need to cut this guy a break because I am retained.”

I thought it also had something to do with them telling me how hard a fight I should expect.

Now, I have learned that there is objective, scientific evidence that retained, private lawyers just deliver better results than do appointed lawyers.

Thomas Cohen, a statistician for the United States Department of Justice, authored a study in which he compared the work of private attorneys, public defenders, and appointed attorneys.  There was a stark difference in results.

The biggest difference between results delivered by private attorneys vs. those delivered by public defenders was in the percentage chance of being sentenced to incarceration.  A defendant who relies on the public defender is 10% more likely to be sentenced to incarceration than if he had hired a private attorney.

For appointed defense attorneys (the system used in Cherokee County and every Alabama county that borders it) the chance of being sentenced to incarceration is about the same as for a public defender (10% higher than with retained attorneys).

Followup studies found that the clients of appointed attorneys are more likely to be convicted than are the clients of retained attorneys.

These are general results. They are not specific to any county located in Alabama or Georgia.

Someone will decry the injustice of appointed attorneys delivering inferior results. If you or a loved one is facing a criminal charge, you can complain about the system too, or you can beg or borrow the money you need to hire a retained attorney.  I know which I would do.

Alabama Right to Counsel Law: https://judicial.alabama.gov/docs/library/rules/cr6_4.pdf