Features
Everything a defender office does,
in one record.
Each stage of the court day has its own screen, and each one writes to the same record. Open any group below for the detail.
Docket and intakeThe morning's docket in once, matched to who the office already knows.
- Whole-docket entry
- Enter a day's docket in one pass rather than one case at a time.
- Prior-case matching
- Each defendant is checked against earlier clients and cases. A person confirms every match before anything saves, so two people are never merged by a guess.
- Jail roster
- Work down the roster marking who is in custody and who has been released. Custody feeds the screening and the appearance on the docket sheet.
- Charge catalog
- A shared catalog of offenses with statute, class, and maximum penalty. The case category forms from the most serious count as charges are added.
- Complaints and allegations
- Probation and bond violations are recorded as what was alleged, not as the original charges, so they count and bill the way they should.
- Printed intake forms
- Blank intake forms with the name, address, and charges already filled in, or the completed form ready to sign at the desk.
Indigency screeningA finding with its reasoning attached, made before arraignment.
- Income against the guideline
- Household income measured against the federal poverty guideline at the multiplier the unit sets, with net income after tax worked out on the form.
- Assets against local cost
- Assets weighed against what retained counsel actually costs in the area, by case level.
- A recommendation that shows its work
- The screening explains why it recommends what it does. The person making the finding still makes it.
- Signed on screen
- The applicant signs on a tablet or touchscreen, and the signed screening prints ready for the file.
- One screening, several cases
- A person with more than one case is screened once and the finding applies to each of them.
- Denial letter and MC 222
- A denial prints its letter, and the request for appointment of an attorney comes off the same record.
- Findings are superseded, not edited
- A corrected screening is a new one. The old one stays on file, so the record shows what was found and when it changed.
Appointment and counselThe right attorney, with their caseload in view while you choose.
- Caps in view
- Every attorney's share of their caseload cap shows on the appointment screen, counted over a rolling year.
- Tier and willingness
- Attorneys are matched to the case level they are qualified for and the work they are taking.
- Prior representation first
- An attorney who already had the client is offered the case first.
- Retained, pro per, and denied
- Each closes the case the right way, with a resolved or not resolved result recorded for the standards.
- Substitution
- Counsel changes for the whole case or from a date forward. Work already done stays with the attorney who did it, and so does the right to bill it.
- CAFA duty
- The counsel-at-first-appearance attorney is assigned by day, sees the court day screens, and their day rate counts once per day.
Courtroom and hearingsRecord what happened in court, and what follows schedules itself.
- Outcomes by hearing type
- Each hearing type has its own list of outcomes, and each outcome knows what comes next.
- Arraignment outcomes
- Pled not guilty, set for plea, plea taken and set for sentencing, plea taken and sentenced, adjourned, or failed to appear. Each one sets the result and schedules the next step.
- Next date from the outcome
- Recording an outcome offers the next hearing at the right court with the right type, rather than a second trip to the calendar.
- Failure to appear and adjournment
- A missed appearance or a continuance is recorded as what it is and carries forward.
- Bond and custody
- Bond with its conditions, and a custody check each time the case is in court for something that could put somebody in jail.
- Violations and bindover
- Probation and bond violations, and bindover to circuit court with the circuit number and judge.
- Disposition and sentence
- The final disposition of each count and the sentence imposed, entered from the courtroom or the case file.
- Docket sheet
- A printed sheet grouped by time block, with marks for video and in-custody appearances that survive a black and white printer.
Case fileEverything about a case on one page, in the order it happened.
- One timeline
- Court dates, custody checks, bond, screenings, and the sentence on a single timeline, with where things stand now across the top.
- Notes with contact logged
- A note can record client contact as part of writing it, rather than as a second thing to enter.
- Tasks and deadlines
- Tasks with due dates, and statutory deadlines computed from the rule with the citation shown.
- Documents
- Uploaded and generated documents, titled by what they are and dated by the document rather than the upload.
- Time on the case
- Billing lines entered from the case they belong to, priced as they are entered.
- Investigator, expert, and interpreter
- Whether each was used, and the language needed, recorded where the standards ask for them.
- Closure check
- Before a case closes, the file shows what is still open on it.
- Search from anywhere
- A case search sits on every screen. An attorney's search covers only their own cases.
Time, billing, and invoicesTime entered once, priced by the rules, approved, and invoiced.
- Grid or case file entry
- Enter a week in a grid or a line from the case. Both land in the same place.
- Rates by category
- Rates come from the case category and the date of the work, so a rate change applies from the day it takes effect.
- Billing at the right level
- A probation violation bills at what was pled to or convicted of, which is usually less than what was charged.
- Approval and send back
- Submitted time is approved by the office or sent back with a reason, and the attorney sees what came back.
- Billing periods
- Periods the unit defines, so invoices follow its own calendar rather than a fixed month.
- Invoices
- An invoice opens with every case billed and gives each one a page of its own.
- Why a line cannot bill
- When something blocks billing, the case file says exactly what is missing.
Calendar and emailThe day arrives in the places people already look.
- Your own calendar
- Subscribe once and every hearing, deadline, and task appears in Outlook, Google, or Apple, and keeps itself current.
- Every county on one calendar
- An attorney who works for more than one county sees every court's dates together, which is where a conflict shows up.
- One email in the morning
- Eight pretrials before the magistrate is eight lines in one message. An empty day sends nothing.
- End of day
- Each attorney gets their own cases from the day's court, with what happened and what is next. The office gets the whole day.
- Staff copies
- An attorney's staff can be copied on the attorney's mail, each with their own settings.
- Email log
- Every message sent is logged with its recipient and status, so a missing email can be traced.
Documents and formsCourt paperwork filled in from the record.
- Generated documents
- Word documents with the court caption laid out properly, filled from the case.
- Court forms
- Court PDF forms such as the request for appointment of an attorney and substitution of counsel, filled in from the case.
- Templates the unit edits
- Discovery demands and the unit's own letters are templates the office maintains.
- Private storage
- Every file is private. A download is a link that expires within a minute.
- Resources and directory
- A shared shelf of files worth keeping, and a phone directory grouped by agency.
Running the officeWhat is waiting, who is carrying what, and where every case sits.
- Dashboard
- What is waiting at each stage, and the oldest hearings with no result recorded, which is the number to drive to zero.
- An attorney's own day
- An appointed attorney's dashboard is their hearings, tasks, and anything the office sent back.
- Pipeline
- Where every open case sits, from appointment to disposition.
- Roster and people
- Attorneys with tier, availability, and when each last signed in. Accounts with roles from administrator to read only, plus reports-only accounts that never see a client's name.
- One login across counties
- An attorney on more than one county's roster signs in once and switches between them. Linked by bar number.
- Work done elsewhere
- Caseload filed by other counties for the same attorney counts against the same cap.
- Ready before the first day
- A Michigan unit starts with its attorney roster and its past year of filed Standard 6 figures already loaded, so every cap is right from the first appointment.
- Reports by category
- More than twenty reports in five groups, each with summary figures, tables to download, and the cases behind every number. Samples of each are on the reports page.
- State and regional reporting
- A state office runs any unit's reports, or a region's or the whole state's, with each unit listed alongside the total and the average. Figures only.
Convenience
The small things that give the day back
Most of the time a system saves is in steps that no longer exist. These are the ones people notice first.
A whole docket at once
Not one case at a time.
The next hearing offered
Recording an outcome proposes what comes next.
Forms already filled in
Name, address, case number, and charges come from the record.
Contact logged in the note
One entry, not two.
The calendar keeps itself
Subscribe once on a phone and forget about it.
One email, not eight
A morning's hearings in a single message.
End of day in one click
Each attorney's own sheet, sent or printed.
Search from anywhere
Every screen, every case you may see.
Signatures on screen
No printing to sign and scanning back.
The CAFA day counted once
However many cases the duty attorney covered.
Rates that look themselves up
Priced by category and date as the line is entered.
A figure's cases one click away
Every number on a report opens to its list.
Side by side
What commercial practice software does, done for appointed work
The left column is what offices expect from the practice-management systems sold to private firms. The right column is how First Appearance does the same job for public defense.
| Commercial practice software | First Appearance | |
|---|---|---|
| Matter management | Matters with notes, tasks, documents, and contacts | Cases with notes, tasks, documents, client contact, and the full court history |
| Calendar | Firm calendar that syncs to Outlook, Google, and Apple | Personal calendar feed to Outlook, Google, and Apple, across every county an attorney works in |
| Deadlines | Court rules deadlines | Statutory deadlines computed per case, each with its citation, and agreed dates recorded as such |
| Time tracking | Timers and time entries | Time entered by grid or from the case, priced at entry by case category |
| Billing | Bills to clients | Billing to the funding unit, with approval, send back, and periods |
| Invoicing | Client invoices | Funding unit invoices with a page per case |
| Documents | Document storage and templates | Private storage with expiring links, generated Word documents, and filled court forms |
| E-signature | Signature requests | Signatures captured on screen for screenings |
| Conflict checking | Conflict search across clients | Prior-case matching on entry, and the prior attorney offered first |
| Client intake | Web intake forms | Docket entry, jail roster, prefilled intake forms, and the indigency screening |
| Reporting | Revenue and productivity reports | More than twenty compliance, workload, case, and billing reports, each with the cases behind it, plus reports-only and state office access |
| Search | Global search | Case search on every screen, limited to what the person may see |
| Notifications | Email reminders | Morning email, end of day by attorney, and copies to staff |
| Permissions | User roles | Roles enforced by the database, with attorneys limited to their own cases |
| Security | Two-factor sign-in | Two-factor sign-in, with every unit's data sealed off from every other |
And what a firm's system was never built to do
- Indigency screening against the poverty guideline and local retainer cost
- Appointment with each attorney's caseload cap in view
- Caseloads counted over a rolling year, across counties
- Courtroom outcomes that schedule the next hearing
- Counsel at first appearance, by duty day
- Quarterly standards reporting with the case list behind every figure
- Regional and statewide reports for a state office, with no client data
- Billing rates set by case category and effective date
- Substitution that keeps work and billing with the attorney who did it