Michigan Law Dean Neel Sukhatme Examines Relationship Between Judicial Campaign Contributions and Court-Appointed Criminal Cases

June 30, 2026 — What looks like routine campaign fundraising in Harris County's criminal courts may be something far more troubling, warned Neel Sukhatme, dean of the University of Michigan Law School, during his talk as part of the University of Houston Law Center’s 2026 Colloquium/External Speaker Series.

Sukhatme presented his forthcoming paper, “Judges for Sale,” which concludes that defense attorneys who donate to judges receive twice as many court-appointed cases in the month of their contribution, with worse outcomes for the defendants they represent.

“[The paper] is very connected to Harris County and Houston,” said Sukhatme, a legal scholar whose work spans corporate regulation, empirical legal studies, and democratic participation. “But this is an issue throughout Texas and other court systems. I think the evidence is very strong that what we’re seeing here is pay to play, or corruption in the courts.”

The study, co-authored by fellow economist Arturo Romero, drew data from more than 800,000 case assignments in Harris County from 2000 to 2020. Sukhatme pointed out that the findings imply these contributions function less as civic participation and more as a direct investment, one with significant financial returns. The paper estimates attorneys earn roughly $6 for every $1 donated, while defendants represented by those same attorneys during donation periods are more likely to be convicted or sent to jail, according to data shared at the presentation.

At the center of the analysis is Harris County’s “wheel” system, intended to assign lawyers at random to represent indigent defendants. Sukhatme said the data suggests the system, while designed to ensure fairness, can be influenced by the judges’ receiving donations and making appointments.

“They don’t get cases from someone else,” he said. “If these donor attorneys are just better, they should be getting more cases from every judge, but they’re only getting them from the judge to whom they donate.”

The pattern extends beyond who gets appointed to how cases move. The authors’ research indicates that the structure of the incentives encourages quicker case turnover. The data shows, Sukhatme said, that judges close more cases and assign more new ones to donor attorneys in the month a contribution is made. On average, he said, donor attorneys see about .22 more cases resolved in that window, while their overall caseload is increased by as many as .76 additional open cases, suggesting that new assignments outpace case resolutions.

“[Our data] is saying that judges, once they get the donation, are willing to close out cases for their benefactors to give them more,” he said.

Sukhatme said the churn may come at a cost to defendants, particularly those who rely on court-appointed counsel. The findings suggest that these clients often end up with unfavorable outcomes, including plea deals reached under pressure to move cases quickly. Paying clients represented by the same attorneys, by contrast, see no such decline in outcomes, he said.

These concerns are not new. Sukhatme pointed to his previous paper, “Pay to Play? Campaign Finance and the Incentive Gap in the Sixth Amendment's Right to Counsel,” which raised similar issues but resulted in little reform.

"My understanding is nothing has happened," he said. "So how can we do something about this?"

Sukhatme’s question prompted a robust discussion with the audience, which introduced new perspectives and possible policy approaches he had not previously explored. Some audience members pressed for alternative explanations in the data and others focused on ethics rules, structural incentives, and the political realities of judicial elections.

According to Sukhatme, the bottom line is that a system designed to ensure fairness may be vulnerable to the same political incentives it was meant to avoid and improvements are needed.