Unified Family Courts: Therapeutic Power and Judicial Authority

• Publication year: 1996
• Pages: 7
• Citation: Vol. 3 No. 2 Pg. 7

Unified Family Courts: Therapeutic Power and Judicial Authority Vol. 3 No. 2 Pg. 7 Utah Bar Journal Summer, 1996

Stephen J. Cribari, J.

Unified family courts have existed in this country since 1914.^[1] Some states have established state-wide unified family courts, others have instituted partial unified family courts. Recently, several jurisdictions have implemented pilot projects,^[2] others are studying their feasibility.^[3]

Unified family courts are courts that are designed to dispense therapeutic justice in an effort to address the personal and social issues that drive families into court. This brief paper offers a description of unified family courts and raises questions about the expansive judicial power associated with them.

In a unified family court, exactly what is it that is "unified?"

As many jurisdictional bases as possible are unified under the authority of the family court, which should be a court of stature equal to the highest trial court in the state. At a minimum, a unified family court should hear matrimonial, domestic violence, juvenile delinquency, child protection, and family crisis cases.^[4] Some unified family courts, such as Hawaii's, assume limited criminal jurisdiction.

The accelerated and coordinated provision of social services is also unified under the authority of the family court, as is coordination of collateral and ancillary matters, such as substance abuse evaluation and treatment programs for family members not directly before the court.

Unified family courts also differ from traditional courts because they are less adversarial. Wherever possible, the techniques of alternative dispute resolution, including mediation, are utilized.

And unified family courts make a deliberate effort to consolidate before the same judge all cases originating from one family. In some high population or urban areas, such as New Jersey, the one family/one judge concept has been modified to the one family/one team notion. In the one family/one team approach, judges are assigned to teams of case managers and social service providers and it is the team, not the judge, which is the constant for each family. This approach maintains a one-to-one correspondence at the level most closely associated with the family, and allows flexibility in judicial assignment.

Establishing a unified family court can be expensive. The court utilizes advanced technology for case management and tracking, and for retrieving information about litigants. The court relies on personnel trained in this technology as well as in the skills required to interact meaningfully with litigants.

Unified family courts also express a commitment by a community to do what is called therapeutic justice: justice that heals a family by addressing the personal and social problems that result in family law cases. Today, those problems most often involve substance abuse, or the mental and emotional problems associated with, or easily mistaken for, substance abuse problems.

Compassionate...