Pubdate: Tue, 16 Apr 2002
Source: Denver Rocky Mountain News (CO)
Copyright: 2002, Denver Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.rockymountainnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/371
Author: Don Thompson, Associated Press
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?159 (Drug Courts)

DRUG COURTS EFFECTIVE, SAYS REVIEW BY COURTS AND DRUG AGENCY

SACRAMENTO- A nearly 10-year-old California experiment with a once-radical 
substance treatment program has proven effective in cutting both crime and 
drug abuse, two groups with interests in the program said Tuesday.

Chief Justice Ronald M. George, a Republican, said in releasing the report 
that the study shows "drug courts are helping the justice system and the 
public by decreasing drug use, improving lives, and protecting communities."

Arrests of drug court graduates dropped 85 percent for two years after they 
successfully completed treatment, compared to two years before they entered 
the program, according to a study of about 3,000 offenders who completed 
the program in 34 California counties.

The California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs and the Judicial 
Council said their study's participants often began with significant problems.

About 70 percent reported using drugs for more than five years, and 40 
percent for more than a decade. Little more than half had graduated from 
high school, and just 13 percent had attended college. A typical offender 
had been arrested twice and jailed once in the two years before joining the 
program.

The study also found that:

_ While 64 percent of offenders were unemployed when they entered the 
program, 70 percent had jobs by the time they left.

_ 95 percent of babies born to mothers in the program were born drug-free, 
and 96 percent of drug tests were negative for participants during the program.

_ 28 percent of graduates retained or regained child custody, 7 percent 
gained visitation rights, and 8 percent caught up on child support payments.

_ The program saved state and local governments $42 million by diverting 
offenders who otherwise would have gone to prison or jail, though that was 
offset by the $14 million spent on the drug courts.

The study ordered by state legislators collected data on offenders sent to 
drug courts in the 34 counties between January 2000 and September 2001.

Drug courts began in Dade County, Fla., in 1989, during the height of the 
South Florida cocaine wars. They were first tried in Oakland in 1993 and 
have since spread across the nation and to 50 of California's 58 counties.

They were among the most tolerant of court-based drug treatment programs 
until November 2000, when California voters followed the lead of Arizona 
and required that first- and second-time nonviolent drug offenders be sent 
to treatment rather than jail.

Still, Proposition 36 treatment programs that have worked best since the 
initiative took effect last July have been those that followed a drug court 
pattern, Butte County Judge Darrell W. Stevens, chair of Judicial Council 
Proposition 36 Implementation Committee, said last week.

He and other advocates laud the courts' reliance on cooperation between law 
enforcement and treatment providers, overseen by a judge who alternately 
threatens and cajoles offenders into getting help and staying drug-free.

Proposition 36 courts work much the same way, but judges are generally 
barred from using the "flash incarcerations" many drug court judges used to 
instantly punish recalcitrant offenders with several days in jail.
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