Lawyers File Suit to Halt Indigent Defense Plan
Five county bar groups filed a lawsuit yesterday to block New York City from moving forward with plans to give most of the indigent criminal defense work now done by private lawyers under the 18-B program to institutional providers (See Complaint). The New York County Lawyers’ Association and the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island bar associations contend that the city’s plan to move some 34,000 conflict cases a year to institutional providers violates County Law §722(3), which only permits the use of private attorneys for indigent defense as part of a bar association created plan.
