With bar advocates on strike, more than 1,300 people lack defense in Mass. courts

More than 1,300 people in Massachusetts have gone to court without a lawyer since last month due to a shortage of court-appointed attorneys, according to the Committee for Public Counsel Services, which oversees legal representation for criminal defendants in Massachusetts.

On May 27, private attorneys who are paid by the state to represent indigent defendants stopped taking on new work, citing low wages. The attorneys, known as “public defender bar advocates,” typically make about $65 an hour in the commonwealth, the lowest rate of any state in New England.

CPCS has called on the state’s highest court to implement the Lavalle protocol. Named after a 2004 Supreme Judicial Court decision, Lavalle requires the state to release pretrial defendants who aren't assigned a lawyer within seven days of their detention. After 45 days without representation, their cases would be dismissed.

At a hearing on Thursday, Holly Smith, a CPCS lawyer, said there 1,387 unrepresented defendants in the commonwealth, 100 of whom were behind bars. That's an increase from when it first filed its emergency petition in court two weeks ago, CPCS said, when there were 858 defendants without a lawyer and 77 in custody.

The organization also requested the SJC temporarily increase bar advocates’ pay rates, which are set by the state legislature, while lawmakers mull a more permanent raise. Suffolk and Middlesex county district courts and the Boston Municipal Court said in court filings the request should be denied, arguing it would overstep the legislature’s authority.

Legislation filed in January would increase the compensation of bar advocates to $73 per hour for district court cases; $105 for non-homicide superior court cases and $150 for homicides. That bill, filed by state Rep. Christopher Markey, has lingered in the joint commission on the judiciary since February.

Associate Justice Dalila Argaez Wendlandt, who is overseeing the case, did not immediately make a decision. She scheduled an evidentiary hearing for July 2.