Reducing backlog is a priority in all court systems, but a program aimed at efficiency in Franklin County had some attorneys crying foul that efforts to move cases along potentially threatened their clients’ rights.
According to an informal advisory ethics opinion from the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s committee on legal ethics and professional responsibility, an “Early Accountability Program” that gave lenient plea offers to criminal defendants after those charged waived their rights before an adequate discovery was conducted led some attorneys to report they had “been threatened with loss of their employment and [had] been subjected to harassment by the court if they [did] not recommend that a client participate” in the program.
