Holistic Representation: An Innovative Approach to Defending Poor Clients Can Reduce Incarceration and Save Taxpayer Dollars — Without Harm to Public Safety

Abstract

On any given day, the vast majority of criminal defendants in America’s courtrooms cannot afford to pay for a lawyer. Given that court-appointed counsel will critically shape the experience of these defendants— many of whom also struggle with drug addiction, mental illness, homelessness, and other chronic problems—it is notable that, to date, little attention has been paid to indigent defense in the ongoing conversation about criminal justice reform and the seemingly intractable problem of mass incarceration in the United States. This trend in part reflects the lack of a robust body of evidence-based research on indigent defense, without which it has been difficult to identify an effective reform agenda. A groundbreaking new study by a team of researchers from the RAND Corporation and the University of Pennsylvania Law School (Penn Law) examines an innovative and promising approach to defending poor clients in criminal cases: holistic defense. This study, summarized here, is the first large-scale empirical evaluation of the impact of holistic representation on criminal justice outcomes, and it marks an important contribution to the nascent body of literature on effective approaches in indigent defense.