Legal Aid Society

1928

New York City’s Primary Provider of Public Defense Representation

A joint study by The Association of the Bar of the City of New York, the Welfare Council, and other groups concluded that legal representation should be provided by The Legal Aid Society rather than a public defender. As a result, there was a rapid growth of the criminal defense work and the Criminal Branch increased its staffing by adding a social worker and four trained investigators. We were also one of the first organizations to add a social work component to its criminal defense work.