Is a private lawyer better than a court-appointed lawyer?
Defendants sometimes think that private lawyers have a significant advantage over the overworked public defender's office or panel lawyers paid a set fee. But do private lawyers provide better representation than government-paid defense attorneys? Many private lawyers, such as criminal defense attorneys , used to be prosecutors or public defenders. Based on studies comparing the results of having a private lawyer and having a lawyer appointed by the court, the data shows that the results for defendants are often the same. For example, one study found that defendants who hired private lawyers and those who hired public defenders had similar rates of conviction and sentencing (although those represented by panel attorneys fared worse). Such statistical evidence isn't always reliable or precise because many things can get in the way. For example, people who hire private lawyers often have little or no previous criminal record. Needy people are twice as likely to be repeat offe...