Determining eligibility for court-appointed counsel in Oklahoma.

What Is a Pauper’s Affidavit in Oklahoma?

What is a pauper’s affidavit? My name is Brian L Jackson. I am a Tulsa father’s rights attorney here with dads.law where fathers are not disposable and we’re going to talk today about a pauper’s affidavit.

What that is is basically it’s a form you can sign with the court for court-appointed counsel in certain situations such as if you’re facing a criminal charge or if you’re facing civil contempt. Generally, if you’re facing losing your freedom, you have a right to counsel, and that is under the sixth amendment to the federal constitution.

If you are unable to afford counsel, then the court can appoint counsel. Now the purpose of the pauper’s affidavit is to ascertain whether or not you can actually afford to pay for counsel and it’ll ask you about where you work, how much you earn, which bills look like, things like that.

The way you can get the form from the county court clerk. You go to the county court clerk and ask for a pauper’s affidavit. It’s a form you can hand right out and then you file that with the court. The court will look at it and determine if you’re entitled to court-appointed counsel. It does not apply in most types of civil cases. It does apply to contempt. It applies to criminal cases if you’re talking about like incarceration or something like that. Or like a really significant fine. It applies to deprive cases and it applies to juvenile delinquency cases.

When Does a Pauper’s Affidavit Apply?

It also applies if, for example, you’re going to go into court as somebody files for adult guardianship on you or if somebody files for guardianship to take your child away or if some other examples are like a mental health proceeding. Usually, it involves some kind of serious invasion of your liberty and you’re not talking about like a lawsuit or divorce or something. But that’s what a pauper’s affidavit is.

And guys, if you have any questions about that, you need to talk to a good lawyer. One place you can find a good lawyer is at dads.law where fathers are not disposable. Thank you.

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