Copy of Survey of Public Defenders: A Design Study

We need your help!

With funding and support from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the Urban Institute has partnered with the National Association for Public Defense (NAPD) and Indigent Defense Research Association (IDRA) to design a survey of defenders that can provide critical information on the work and needs of defenders across the country.

We want to make sure the survey reflects defenders’ research interests and collects reliable information on areas such as attorney experience, training, workload, use of support staff, client and case attributes, and quality of representation. Your answers to the questions below - write as much or as little as you like - will be of great assistance. All answers are anonymous.

Once the survey is developed, we will partner with jurisdictions across the country to pilot test the questionnaire to ensure that it speaks to the diversity of indigent defenders. For more information, contact Principal Investigator Jeanette Hussemann at the Urban Institute at jhussemann@urban.org.

Thank you!

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* 1. What are the most important specific questions we should ask defenders?

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* 2. Do you think that collecting information on public defenders is important? Why or why not?

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* 3. What kinds of comparisons would be useful? (e.g. ability to compare attorneys by specialization, attorneys in urban vs. rural places, etc.?)

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* 4. What would make participating in a survey like this more attractive?

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* 5. I would describe myself as:

A public defender (salaried, full-time or part-time attorney rendering court-appointed criminal defense services through a public or private nonprofit organization, or as a direct government paid employee.)

A contract attorney (nonsalaried private attorney or member of a group of attorneys such as a bar association, law firm, consortium or other group that contract with a funding source to provide court-appointed criminal defense services in a jurisdiction.)

Assigned counsel attorney (appointed from a list of private bar members who provide court-appointed criminal defense services on a judge-by-judge, court-by-court, or case-by-case basis.)

Non-attorney working in criminal defense services.

Something else (please describe)

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* 6. My practice encompasses the following areas (choose all that apply)

Representation of adults accused of crime

Representation of juveniles accused of crime/delinquency

Representation of defendants accused of capital crimes

Appellate criminal representation

Other (please describe)

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* 7. Do you have leadership, management or supervisory duties as part of your job?

Yes

N/A, or decline to answer