The effectiveness of public defenders in four Florida counties

The present study utilizes data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics to examine the effectiveness of public defenders in Florida to assess whether the case outcomes of defendants with public defenders are similar to the case outcomes of defendants with retained attorneys, controlling for legally-relevant variables. The present study utilizes both logistic and OLS regression analysis to examine differences between attorneys for seven different case outcomes. Results indicate that defendants with public defenders are more likely to be detained pretrial, more likely to be convicted, and less likely to have their cases dismissed. The results dispute previous research which found few, if any, differences between public defenders and retained counsel. Results suggest that, at least in the counties examined, defendants with public defenders suffer from a lack of quality counsel. •Comparisons of public defenders and retained attorneys found the following:•Public defender clients are more likely to be detained pretrial•Public defender clients are less likely to have charges dismissed•Public defender clients are more likely to be convicted•No differences for other case outcomes studied