December Highlights

Forty years ago, Osborne Association pioneered a new program designed to improve the quality of representation for indigent felony defendants.

At the time, most were represented by the Legal Aid Society, but the organization was not permitted to represent co-defendants or anyone charged with homicide. The court-appointed attorneys these individuals facing serious charges were assigned did not always appeal bail decisions or submit pre-sentence reports. These reports provide background information about a defendant, including histories of mental illness, trauma, or abuse, that can introduce alternatives to incarceration as options where appropriate.

Called the Assigned Counsel Alternatives Advocacy Project, and then Assigned Counsel Services, Osborne’s program took aim at what its creator, former President and CEO Elizabeth Gaynes, saw as a failure to apply the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution and go beyond the facts and into an indigent defendant’s personal history. As Liz notes, Osborne was the first organization to receive a grant from New York State’s Alternative to Incarceration funding in the mid-1980s to provide “defender-based advocacy.” The field has grown to include a mitigation specialists who uncover information that explains a defendant’s behavior and helps the court better understand the person before them.

Over the years, other so-named defender organizations became active in New York City, while Osborne’s work under former EVP of Programs Susan Gottesfeld broadened to include forensic social workers in a wider array of cases and to take cases from defender organizations when their own staff couldn’t. Today, Osborne’s Court Services and Decarceration work has expanded to serve the five boroughs and six northern counties, and to include a range of diversion programs and alternatives to incarceration. Our team continues to partner with defense attorneys to ensure their clients are seen as individuals, providing the advocacy needed to achieve better results in the courtroom. Last year alone, our Court Advocacy Services saved taxpayers $162 million in unnecessary incarceration costs and 1,411 years behind bars for people better served by community-based programs.

We close out the year with reflections on the impact of Osborne’s decades-long work to see humanity in all our participants and to pursue solutions that will prevent further harm. Read more here.