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A Public Defender Efficacy Study | 18 comments (18 topical)

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not very convincing (none / 0) (#14)
by syinco on Tue Jan 09, 2007 at 12:18:11 AM EST
After reading this, it's not at all clear to me that the discrepancy they suggest is statistically significant (though like JM, I'm not a statistician).  By one measure, they cite a three year discrepancy (which does sound significant); by another, they find that, in terms of essentially percentage-wise sentence reduction, private counsel is 94% effective vs. 92% for PDs (which isn't clearly a significant difference to me).  

Combine that with the questionable decision to account for probation/acquittal simply as zero as well as some other questionable assumptions they made and the fact that the study as written makes it difficult to decipher how/why they addressed variables as they did, and I don't know if we're looking at statistical noise or something meaningful.

Regardless, while the "marginal indigence" theory has at least some intuitive appeal, it seems quite a stretch to suggest that this is a major factor in the discrepancy.  It seems worthy of mention as a possible contributor, but they give it surprising (and I think unsubstantiated) weight in the study as well as the op-ed.  

Even if their analysis is correct and statistically meaningful, I did not read anything that convinced me that the discrepancy is not due to more conventional assumptions.  To go so far as to conclude the op-ed with the suggestion of tightening indigency parameters seems irresponsible.

A Public Defender Efficacy Study | 18 comments (18 topical)

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