High-Impact Grant Proposal
Misdemeanor Early Representation Project: Bureau of Justice Assistance, Smart Defense Initiative, $378,000
On behalf of a county Public Defender office and in partnership with a local police department, we designed this project (and wrote the inaugural grant proposal) to provide point-of-arrest referral information for people arrested and cite-released on misdemeanor charges. With the explicit goal of reducing “failures to appear” at court, the Early Rep project has been lauded by its funder, the Bureau of Justice Assistance, for its ability to improve judicial efficiencies, reduce failures to appear, and enhance procedural justice for low-income defendants.
