Definition of Public Lawyer

In the legal framework there are general principles accepted by all nations. Thus, it is established that every person has right to be defended before the courts of justice and in the event of not having the economic resources necessary for this, you can be attended by a public defender. In this sense, the assistance of a lawyer is a public service financed by the state. If this public service did not exist, the equality of citizens before the law.

Regarding its etymology, the word lawyer comes from advocatus, a word that is formed from the Latin expression "ad auxilium vocatus" (the person who helps or the one called to help). The term office comes from officium, which in turn derives from opificium (this word is formed by opus, which is equivalent to work, and by the verb facere, that is, to do).

In legal terminology, the service offered by these lawyers is known as a duty shift.

As a general guideline, those who are integrated in the duty shift are lawyers with their corresponding official qualifications and who are part of a bar association of a

territory. Normally, lawyers are required to have a minimum of professional experience before providing this service and to have taken specific courses on different legal matters.

These professionals receive an economic allowance for their legal assistance to the detainees and for all the procedures related to their arrest and subsequent trial.

On the other hand, access to the duty shift is voluntary. This does not mean that the public defender is a public official, since the lawyer who engages in this activity tends to make it compatible with the exercise of his profession privately.

In order for an individual to receive the free advice of a lawyer, the state must first recognize this right. In the framework of law, institution of the duty shift is included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In Ancient Rome and in some territories of medieval Europe there were lawyers for the poorest

The most remote historical precedent of the public defender is found in Roman civilization, where there were already lawyers for people without resources economic, the causadici. In the Middle Ages the tradition of Roman civilization continued. Thus, in medieval times, society was divided into classes and a large sector of the population he lived in a situation of poverty. It is in the context of medieval Europe where the figure of the "lawyer for the poor" appears. The lack of protection of the poor in defending his rights was based on the values ​​of the Christian tradition.

In the case of the Crown of Castile, the legal texts specified that lawyers had the obligation moral to legally assist those who were in extreme poverty. With the passage of time, the advocacy of the poor spread to the territories of America.

In the world of law, there is also another voluntary activity without financial retribution, the pro bono public.

Pro bono legal is an activity that legal professionals carry out altruistically when they consider that some individuals or groups need their services for free. The term pro bono is a Latin abbreviation for pro bono public and means "for the public good."

Fotolia photos: Sabelskaya / Saiful

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