Lawmakers Weigh Law School Partnerships to Combat Texas' Rural Legal Deserts

DALLAS (SMU) – Deason Criminal Justice Reform Center Executive Director Pamela Metzger testified before Texas lawmakers about strategies to fill critical public defense and prosecution positions in rural parts of the state, where fewer than 1% of Texas criminal attorneys practice. Metzger was the first speaker at the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence hearing on “Rural Criminal Justice Workforce Development.” The hearing focused on developing partnerships with Texas law schools to incentivize, train, and recruit and  a new generation of rural criminal attorneys.

The hearing gathered Texas university officials, public defenders and prosecutors to address the growing criminal legal desert crisis in rural Texas and explore pipeline programs centered on targeted recruitment, financial incentives and hands-on rural legal training.

Metzger called the shrinking number of attorneys in rural counties across Texas, “a constitutional crisis.” Metzger noted the shortage of rural attorneys creates a two-tiered system of ‘justice-by-geography’.

“We’ve actually codified this geographical disadvantage. … When you’re appointing counsel for someone who’s indigent, if they live in a county of more than a quarter million people, they’ll have a lawyer within 24 hours of submitting their application. But if you live in one of Texas’ smaller counties, you can wait three working days. There’s no legal obligation to get you an attorney for an incredibly long time.”

The Deason Center’s 2021 policy report, Greening Criminal Legal Deserts in Rural Texas, found:

• Fewer than 1% of Texas attorneys are rural criminal lawyers
• In 65 rural counties, no local lawyer accepted an adult criminal appointment in 2021
• Between 2015 and 2022, Texas lost one-quarter of its rural defense attorneys
• Rural Texans charged with misdemeanors are four times less likely to have legal representation than their urban counterparts.

The attorney shortage in dozens of Texas counties has strained both prosecution and public defense systems. In many cases, arrested people either languish in jail waiting for an attorney or face a judge without one — risking lengthy jail time and hefty court fines without ever receiving legal advice. 

States like Kansas and Nebraska have already taken action to address their own rural legal deserts. In April, Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly signed the Attorney Training Program for Rural Kansas Act into law. The program will offer law students at the University of Kansas and Washburn University an annual stipend and up to $100,000 in loan repayment. The University of Nebraska offers a similar program that recruits students at the high school level and provides free LSAT prep, scholarships to state colleges, rural internships and automatic admission to the University of Nebraska Law School.

Joe Stephens is the Chief Public Defender for the Caprock Regional Public Defender Office at Texas Tech School of Law. Stephens called working in a rural public defender’s office the best classroom for an early career attorney. He added, “if there’s a chief public defender in a rural community listening to this right now, they’re not only thinking about the personal caseload they carry, they’re also thinking about the people they have to go out and recruit. And the offices that are understaffed that they’re trying to maintain and serve.”

Without targeted intervention, many rural communities will continue losing access to attorneys at a pace that threatens the fairness and functioning of the justice system. Texas has the opportunity to act now and begin rebuilding that pipeline.

For more on the public defense crisis in rural Kansas and across the state of Texas, review our policy briefs: Greening Criminal Legal Deserts in Rural Texas and Solving the Public Defense Crisis in Kansas  

Watch the live stream of the committee hearing here.