NCJ Number
117719
Date Published
1988
Length
188 pages
Annotation
Each year law school clinics provide free or low-cost legal assistance to thousands of custodial parents, noncustodial parents and children involved in child support cases.
Abstract
In order to provide an overview of the types of clinics actually dealing with child support and to inform schools without clinics of what is occurring in the field, a survey of all 175 ABA-accredited law schools in the country was implemented. Forty-six percent of the law schools indicated they have clinics that handle child support issues in some manner and generally service the area in the vicinity of the law school. Clinics usually provide full-service coverage for the client with the supervision of a faculty member. When it comes to enforcing a support order, clinics pursue contempt and income withholding remedies more often than any other forms of relief. About half of the 82 clinics that handle support cases work to some degree with child support enforcement agencies, and several schools are affiliated with local Legal Services Corporation grantees. A large majority of clinics operates year-round. Clients usually do not have to pay for their clinic-provided legal services outside of the court costs. 2 appendixes.