BIG NEWS: For two years, from 2015 to 2017, I served on a Judicial Conference committee to review the operation of the Criminal Justice Act. Today, our 341-pg report recommending reforms --aka the Cardone Report-- has finally been made public. It's here: cjastudy.fd.org/sites/default/… 
We agreed re most of our recommendations, incl. establishing a federal defender commission to administer & oversee the defense function. But I disagreed w/my colleagues on how to structure the commission. My separate statement, App. M, is here: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… It opens:
Tagging a few who may (or may not) have particular interest in the report: @CBHessick @RachelBarkow @barryfriedman1 @brandonlgarrett @SLandP
The committee spent an extraordinary amount of time on researching these issues and producing the report -- see text below -- so I hope our recommendations are of broad interest to those who follow federal criminal law and the defense function more broadly.
If you're not in the mood to wade through the full report -- which would be really rewarding, seriously -- here's the executive summary: cjastudy.fd.org/sites/default/…
This is the main takeaway, for those wanting the two-paragraph version.
