Committee for Public Counsel Services and the Office of the Commissioner of Probation's Administration and Oversight of State-Sponsored Legal Services to Indigent Individuals in District Courts

This is a State Auditor review of how Massachusetts provided and oversaw publicly funded legal help for people who could not afford lawyers in district court cases.

“This audit examines the indigency verification system used by the CPCS and the Office of the Commissioner of Probation (OCP), which administers certain important aspects of the verification system.”

The auditor looked at this because costs were rising and there were questions about how the public defense system used private lawyers versus public defenders.

“This audit was initiated in part due to calls to stem the rise of CPCS costs and questions regarding the CPCS’s reliance on private attorneys rather than public defenders.”

The right to a lawyer is fundamental, but the state also needs to make sure taxpayer-funded help goes to people who truly qualify.

“To maintain public confidence in this program, it must be administered to certify that only those persons who cannot adequately contribute to their own defense receive the assistance of the CPCS and that only legitimate defense costs are covered.”

For ordinary residents, this is about whether public money for legal defense is being spent carefully and fairly, especially when state budgets are tight.

“But, there is another practical reason for proper administration of such a direct expenditure program: the Commonwealth has limited resources in its budget to pay for programs like this.”

The auditor found CPCS had improved its controls over attorney bills, but probation offices in district courts were not reliably checking whether defendants qualified for free legal help.

“Although the OSA’s tests of the CPCS’s new controls on defense billings showed that they have been successful in weeding out unallowable and questionable charges, the OSA found that the OCP has not established a statewide, standard process to be used in each court and that there is no system in place to monitor the extent to which each court is complying with its indigency verification requirement.”

The issue was not a small paperwork problem: the auditor said similar weaknesses across all 27 reviewed courts made it reasonable to question a much larger statewide amount.

“Because these significant deficiencies exist at all 27 courts reviewed, it is reasonable to question the entire $82.3 million expended during fiscal year 2010 to aid indigent clients at all 70 district courts statewide.”

“Indigent” means a person is poor enough, under court rules, to qualify for a state-paid lawyer; probation officers were supposed to verify that status.

“Although the CPCS is responsible for providing legal counsel to indigent persons in accordance with Section 2½ of Chapter 211D, the Chief Probation Officer assigned to each court is responsible for ensuring that a person claiming to be indigent meets the definition of being indigent as established by Rule 3:10, Section 1, of the Supreme Judicial Court.”