Bangor Studio/Membership Department
63 Texas Ave.
Bangor, ME 04401

Lewiston Studio
1450 Lisbon St.
Lewiston, ME 04240

Portland Studio
323 Marginal Way
Portland, ME 04101

Registered 501(c)(3) EIN: 22-3171529
© 2025 Maine Public
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Scroll down to see all available streams.
Maine Public Radio and Classical have been experiencing intermittent outages/weak signal on 91.1 and 89.7 FM stations.

State Supreme Court halts indigent defense hearings, pending appeal

The Maine Supreme Court has halted hearings in a long-running indigent defense lawsuit while the legal challenge is appealed.

The Law Court ruled late Friday that individual hearings for the release of indigent criminal defendants held in jail for more than two weeks without an attorney cannot go forward pending an appeal in the case. Superior Court Justice Michaela Murphy had moved to begin hearings with criminal defendants this week, to decide if they were eligible for release.

The State filed an emergency motion earlier this month to stop the hearings, arguing that Maine appellate procedure prevents the Superior Court from taking action during an appeal.

In the Supreme Court's ruling, Chief Justice Valerie Stanfill agreed with the state. But to expedite that appeal, Stanfill scheduled oral arguments in the case for October.

Kaitlyn Budion is Maine Public’s Bangor correspondent, joining the reporting team after several years working in print journalism.