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Task Force Set To Help Ohioans Access Attorneys For Civil Cases

Low income Ohioans who are accused of a crime are appointed a public defender. Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor says those people often fall through the cracks when they need an attorney to handle a civil case. O’Connor has created a task force of legal experts and judges to come up with ways to better serve those people. She tells Ohio Public Radio's Jo Ingles about the charge she gave the task force recently at its first meeting.

O’Connor – “The goal of the task force here is to examine the obstacles that individuals face in accessing justice in our civil legal arena.  And it’s a very real problem and not one that is limited to Ohio.  This is across the country.  The courts are littered with pro se litigants, folks that find themselves involved in the legal system.  They cannot afford an attorney and there are not attorneys available for them because the civil legal aid is not funded sufficiently to provide attorneys for all who need them.  And when I say provide attorneys, this is not somebody was in a car accident and they are suing the person who hit them.  That’s not it at all.  These are people who are involved in the most desperate situations of life – domestic relations, child custody, where they are going to live, what kind of access they are going to have to some of the basics that everyone is entitled to.”

Ingles – “Now you said that Ohio should follow some models that work in other states, that there are some pros and cons and you gave the task force ideas of what to look for and what to ignore.  Tell me about those.”

O’Connor – “Well I think that it’s important that we come up with real solutions.  There are 32 states that already have access to justice commissions and they are just different models for different states.  Not all will be beneficial to Ohio.  We, as a court, depending on the level of involvement or oversight that is recommended by this court, we are not going to be in the position of raising money for example.  That’s not something the court does is raise money.  We can weigh in on the public funding for budgeting – that sort of thing – with the legislature or congress or whomever.  Some models are very strong on that.  We have to look at models in Ohio that will establish networking with other entities that can come together to address this need.  You know we not only have low income people who are caught up in this net but we have people who have their lack of access by just physical barriers although most courthouses have stepped up and the local governments are improving that.  We have language barrier accesses so the court rules we have implemented have gone a long way to getting interpreters into the courtrooms for people who have English as their second language.  So we are well on the way to greatly helping with that problem.  But a lot of it has to do with people who truly don’t know, and there’s no way they should be able to, how to negotiate the civil legal system.”

Ingles – “And you said you absolutely don’t want window dressing.  Tell me about that.”

O’Connor – “I just don’t want a commission set up and say we have an access to justice commission.  That’s not good enough.  It is not a foregone conclusion that we need to set up this permanent structure.  This is a problem that is not just in the lap of the court.  It goes to so many other institutions and we need to partner with those institutions and do so with the commitment towards (….everybody moving in the same direction.)”

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