Drug courts: treating drug-using offenders through sanctions, incentives.

Summary

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Substance Abuse - Cover Story

The new technique being employed by drug courts is receiving mixed reactions from the public. In a drug court, the judge deals directly with the offender and decides on the rehabilitation treatment needed by the offender. Although the approach as led to a high reduction in the number of drug-related cases, many people frown on the drug court system. Drug courts, on the other hand, defend that it can offer the intervention needed by the drug addict. The intervention consist of treatment and rehabilitation programs, aftercare and incentives.

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Drug courts: treating drug-using offenders through sanctions, incentives.

Interest in drug courts is sweeping the nation as a number of innovative drug courts have reported success in reducing the levels of drug abuse, incarceration and criminal recidivism among drug-using offenders. That interest is heightened by the realization that these same offenders clog court calendars, strain treasuries and flood the jails and prisons. (According to a recent American Bar Association report, imprisonment of drug offenders alone increased by 327 percent between 1986 and 1991.)

Some have criticized drug courts as a radical and unwarranted departure for the courts. However, there is nothing radical or even particularly new about how a drug court works.

Drug courts, in fact, mark a turning back to a time when judges ran their own calendars and were responsible for their court's operations, defendants had to answer directly and immediately to the judge for their conduct, and cases moved slowly and purposefully through the judicial system rather than relying on sentencing guidelines, mandatory minimums and negotiated pleas to speed up the court proces...

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