Maine’s federal public defender warns of crisis in system for indigent defendants

By Steve Mistler, Maine Public

Maine’s federal defender and court-appointed attorneys are sounding the alarm about a dire funding shortfall that they say could mean delayed trials for indigent clients.

Nearly 60 private attorneys in Maine stopped getting paid to represent low-income clients in federal criminal cases on July 3.

While those payments will resume Oct. 1, James Nixon, the federal defender for the district of Maine, warned the state’s congressional delegation this week that the three-month delay is exacerbating a crisis that threatens defendants’ constitutional right to a speedy trial.

That’s because the voucher suspension it has caused could prompt private attorneys and associated vendors to turn down cases.

“Absent a supplemental appropriation of $115.7 million for the Defender Services program, private attorneys in Maine and nationwide will remain unpaid for months,” Nixon wrote. “Moreover, the current deficit will likely worsen and bring dire complications to the federal defense system and court operations in the next fiscal year.”

Public defenders around the country have raised similar concerns about a systemwide funding shortfall that could also affect next year’s budget. They say vouchers for private attorneys are needed to sustain the work of public defender offices that have been under a hiring freeze for the past 17 months because of tight budgets approved by Congress.

“The right of a criminal defendant to effective counsel regardless of the defendant’s economic status is guaranteed under our Constitution and the Criminal Justice Act,” Judge Amy St. Eve, chair of the Judicial Conference’s Budget Committee, said in a statement earlier this month. “That fundamental right is at risk because we ran out of funding on July 3 to pay the private practice attorneys appointed to represent federal defendants.”

Kaylee Folster, a Bangor attorney who co-signed Nixon’s letter, said the delay could cause hardships across the entire public defender system. She said some of the court-appointed attorneys are sole proprietors who rely on the voucher program.

According to a release from the federal court system, 90 percent of defendants facing criminal charges cannot afford their own attorney. Public defender offices handle about 60 percent of those cases, while the rest are assigned to private attorneys.

This story appears through a media partnership with Maine Public.