This model, prevalent in the Prairie State Legal Services region, provides complete dissolution of marriage services, but with extensive staff support and limited time commitments by the attorneys. Typically, the legal service office staff prescreens clients to determine eligibility. Staff prepares the initial petition and service documents for the client to sign, as well as the proposed judgment. The client is then referred to the next regularly scheduled clinic, usually held during a workday evening. Clients are interviewed on the night of the clinic by the volunteer attorney, and changes are made in the documents as needed.
Clients sign the papers, and they are filed the next day.
Once the papers are filed, a court date is scheduled for the cases. Most divorce clinic cases are set for the same date, so the attorney has to show up only once to finish the entire caseload of divorce matters accepted at the clinic. In a well run clinic situation, the attorney meets with clients during a three hour period and shows up in court for the hearing for another hour. As many as five to six clients can be served by each attorney at the clinic. In many instances, these types of clinics are divided so that a single law firm takes responsibility for alternate clinic dates, while individual private attorneys handle the other scheduled clinics.