Public Defender Train The Trainer, Internship and Intern Training Program

This program is funded under both the Edward Byrne Memorial Competitive Grant Program (Byrne Competitive Program) and the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) Program. Authorized by the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2009 (Pub. L. 111-8), the Byrne Competitive Program helps local communities improve the capacity of state and local justice systems and provides for national support efforts including training and technical assistance programs strategically targeted to address local needs. The JAG Program (42 U.S.C. 3751(a)) is the primary provider of federal criminal justice funding to state and local jurisdictions, and JAG funds support all components of the criminal justice system. The JAG Program authorization also provides that the Attorney General may reserve not more than 5 percent, to be granted to 1 or more states or units of local government for 1 or more of the purposes specified in section 3751 of this title, pursuant to his determination that the same is necessary to combat, address, or otherwise respond to precipitous or extraordinary increases in crime, or in a type or types of crime. (42 U.S.C. 3756).

The National Initiatives: Adjudication program, administered by the Office of Justice Programs' (OJP) Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), helps improve criminal justice systems, in particular indigent defense, community prosecution, and addressing the "CSI effect" hypothesis by providing national programs/efforts, such as training and technical assistance, to address the needs of state and local justice systems and communities.

The Southern Center for Human Rights (SCHR) in partnership with Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC) and Equal Justice Works (EJW) will use the grant funds to support an Indigent Defense Fellowship, Training and Development Partnership. The goals of this program are: increased number of trained public defenders, with a minimum of 22 Equal Justice Corps; increased knowledge of criminal justice practitioners through in-person training, with a minimum of 80% of fellows who complete training rating it satisfactory or better in evaluation forms, demonstrating post tests with improved scores over pretests, and demonstrating personal evaluations that indicate the positive impact of training on job performance as "satisfactory or better"; increase criminal justice agencies' ability to solve problems and/or modify policies and practices, with a minimum of 80% of host defender office chiefs/supervisors who complete semi-annual evaluation reports indicating the improvement of on-site services provided by their assigned fellow(s) as satisfactory or better in terms of building their office's capacity to solve problems and/or modify policies and practices; and increase the knowledge of criminal justice practitioners through the development and/or revision of training curricula.

CA/NCF