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Coordinator 101

Coordinator 101. Rose M. Ewing. Drug Court History. First Drug Court was implemented in Miami, Florida in 1989. Today, there are approximately 2,500 therapeutic courts in the U.S. Drug Courts exist in all 50 states.

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Coordinator 101

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  1. Coordinator 101 Rose M. Ewing

  2. Drug Court History First Drug Court was implemented in Miami, Florida in 1989. Today, there are approximately 2,500 therapeutic courts in the U.S. Drug Courts exist in all 50 states. The types of courts fashioned after the Drug Court model has expanded in recent years.

  3. Drug Court Programs Drug Court participants are closely supervised by a judge who is supported by a team of agency representatives that operate outside of their traditional roles. Team members include treatment providers, district attorneys, public defenders and probation/parole. Generally, there is a high level of supervision and standardized tx.

  4. Problem Solving Court Types • Traditional Drug Courts • Co-Occurring Courts • DUI/DWI Courts • Mental Health Courts • Family Drug Courts • Veterans Treatment Courts • Juvenile Drug Courts

  5. How Do Drug Courts Work? • Drug Courts use the coercive authority of the criminal justice system to require treatment in lieu of incarceration. • This model links the resources of the criminal justice system and the treatment programs and has positive effects by lowering recidivism and future drug use.

  6. Do Drug Courts Work? Proof? • Extensive Research on Drug Courts • Reduction of Future Criminal Behavior • Reduced Healthcare Costs • Cost Savings $$

  7. Summary of Drug Court Research • Drug Courts(DC) are successful at retaining offenders in treatment. • DC provide more comprehensive supervision of offenders. • Drug use is reduced for offenders who participate in Drug Court. • Criminal Recidivism is reduced for offenders.

  8. Summary of Drug Court Research • Drug Courts can generate cost savings. • Drug Court bridge the gap between multiple publicly funded systems. • Source: Belenko (1998, 2001)

  9. Defining Drug Courts: The 10 Key Components • 10 Operational Benchmark Characteristics • Performance Standards • Source: NADCP 1997

  10. Main Policy Questions • How do drug courts operationalize the 10 Key Components? • What practices do they use? Which practices are consistently implemented and which have considerable variation across courts? • How do the practices implemented in various drug courts relate to outcomes? • Source: NPC research

  11. Correlation between Drug Court Practices and Outcomes • Outcomes examined: • Graduation Rates • Cost • Recidivism • Source: NPC research, Comparative Study of 18 Adult Drug Courts (2008)

  12. Ten Key Components (Elements) • What are the 10 Key Components? • How can you incorporate them? • Can I pick and choose? • Which are most important? • How do I decide where to begin?

  13. Key Component #1Integrate Treatment and Court Case • Drug Courts integrate alcohol and other drug treatment, mental health, and medical services with justice system case processing. • What is a coordinated response? • Is the courtroom actually a theatre?

  14. Key Component #1Key Practices • Central Intake • Group & Individual Counseling • Treatment is part of Team • Treatment is expected to attend staffing • Written regular progress reports • Tx Sits on Steering Committee • Tx is expected to attend court • More than one tx agency

  15. Key Component #1Integrate Treatment and Court Case • Drug Courts that required Treatment at Court had 9x greater savings (35% v 4%) • Drug Courts that expected public defender at team meetings had 8x greater savings (41% v 5%) • Drug Courts that expected the prosecutor to attend all team meetings had 2x greater savings

  16. Key Component #1Integrate Treatment and Court Case • Drug Courts that included law enforcement as a member of the team had greater cost savings (46% v 25%) • Drug Courts that required ALL TEAM MEMBERS to attend staffing had twice the savings (40% v 19%) • Source: NPC Research

  17. Key Component #2Non-Adversarial Approach • Using a non-adversarial approach, prosecution and defense promote public safety while protecting the participant’s due process rights. • Can you transition to team thinking? • Can you respect each team member’s viewpoint and role? • Healthy debate on policies/cases? • Can you differ in opinion?

  18. Key Component #2Key Practices • Use of incarceration as an incentive to enter Drug Court. • Prosecutor/Defense presents a united front to clients in court. • Defense/Prosecution attend court. • Prosecution /Defense attend staffing. • DC allows non-drug charges. • Unsuccessful participants receive their original sentence.

  19. Key Component #2Non-Adversarial Approach • Drug Courts that accepted participants with non-drug charges had nearly twice the savings (37% v 22%) • Drug Courts that accepted prior violence charges had no difference in graduation rates • Drug Courts that accepted prior violence charges had no difference in cost savings (39% v 32) • (NPC Research)

  20. Key Component #3Early Identification • Eligible participants are identified early and promptly placed in the program. • Is it really important to get participants into the program quickly? • What does quickly really mean?

  21. Key Component #3Key Practices • DC uses elimination of jail/prison as an incentive to enroll/complete. • Central intake for Tx referral. • Written eligibility requirements. • 20 days or less from arrest to entry. • Caseloads of 150 clients or fewer. • Admitted to program post-plea. • Allows non-drug charges. • DC uses SA/MH screenings.

  22. Key Component #3Early Identification • Drug Courts in which the participant entered the program within 20 days of arrest had twice the cost savings (20% v 15%) • The trauma of arrest can be an opportunity for the participant to address issues of denial. • Participants are usually highly motivated to get out of jail.

  23. Key Component #4Continuum of Care • Drug Courts provide access to a continuum of alcohol, drug, and other related treatment, mental health and rehabilitation services. • Is it better to have a single treatment agency or to have multiple options? • How important is relapse prevention?

  24. Key Component #4Continuum of Care • Drug Courts provide access to a continuum of alcohol, drug, and other related treatment, mental health and rehabilitation services. • Is it better to have a single treatment agency or to have multiple options? • How important is relapse prevention?

  25. Key Component #4Continuum of Care • Do your treatment agencies use evidence based practices? • Are the curriculums manualized? • Does treatment integrate mental health and substance abuse? • How does treatment screen for trauma? Treat trauma? • Are treatment groups gender specific? • How is treatment progress reported?

  26. Key Component #4Continuum of Care • How are participants screened and assessed? • Are different levels of care available? • What about services for mental health issues? • Do you have treatment options for veterans, tbi, ptsd, etc.? • What about domestic violence?

  27. Key Component #4Key Practices • Offer group and individual Tx. • Provides Treatment by phases. • DC offers education and employment services. • DC offers ancillary services. • DC takes one year of less to complete. • Has guidelines on the frequency of treatment, group and individual.

  28. Key Component #4Continuum of Care • Drug Courts that used a single coordinating treatment agency had 10 x greater savings (36% v3%) • Drug Courts that included a phase focused on relapse prevention had 3x greater savings (41% v 13%) • (NPC Research)

  29. Key Component #5Drug Testing • Abstinence is monitored by frequent drug and alcohol testing. • How frequent should testing be? • How much do drug courts reduce drug use? • How quickly should drug tests be available? • What type of drug testing is best?

  30. Key Component #5Drug Testing • Drug Testing Should be: • Court Ordered • Random • Frequent • Available within 48 hours • What drugs do you test for? • Do you test for alcohol? • How do you respond to missed tests? Adulterated tests?

  31. Key Component #5Drug Testing • How long should the court allow for marijuana positives after plea? • 50 ng/ml cutoff = 10 days • 20 ng/ml cutoff= 21 days • Should you use drug testing levels?

  32. Key Component #5Key Practice • Random drug tests. • Urine/breath tests most common. • Use alcohol testing bracelet. • In Phase 1, drug tests 2x week. • Uses call-in system for random. • Drug test results available within 48 hours to team. • 90 days of clean UAs prior to grad. • Tx agency sole collector of UAs.

  33. Key Component #5Drug Testing • Courts that required drug testing 2 or more times per week during phase 1 had greater savings (33% v -9%) • Courts that received drug test results within 48 hours had 3x greater savings (33% v 10%) • Drug courts that required greater than 90 days of abstinence had larger cost savings (36% v 13%)

  34. Key Component #6Incentive & Sanctions • Coordinated strategy governs the court’s responses to participant’s compliance and non-compliance(aka incentives and sanctions. • Do your guidelines on team response need to be in writing? • How important is jail as a sanction? • Should sanctions be graduated? • Can incentives be too frequent?

  35. Key Component #6Key Strategies • Drug Courts use jail as a sanction. • DC use graduated sanctions. • Written policies and rules of conduct provided to clients. • Provides incentives to clients. • Impose sanctions in advance of regular scheduled court review. • Use increased support attendance as a sanction. • Only judge can provide sanctions/incentives.

  36. Key Component #6Incentives & Sanctions • Drug Courts that had written rules for team response had nearly 3 x the costs savings (39% v 14%) • Participants facing the possibility of jail as a sanction had lower recidivism • NPC Research

  37. Key Component #6Incentives & Sanctions • Drug Courts that had written rules for team response had nearly 3 x the costs savings (39% v 14%) • Participants facing the possibility of jail as a sanction had lower recidivism • NPC Research

  38. Key Component #6Incentives & Sanctions • The purpose of staffing is develop a consensus related to a coordinated response to client behavior. • Who should attend? Judge, Coordinator, Defense, Prosecutor, Treatment, Probation, Law Enforcement, Court Services • Vet Courts may also include veteran reps • MHC may also include advocates, peer mentors • When? Prior to court review • Why? Shared consensus, informed decisions

  39. Key Component #7 Ongoing Judicial Interaction • Ongoing judicial interaction with each participant is essential. • Does it matter how long the judge spends with each participant? • How long should judges stay in Drug Court? • Should judges rotate frequently in and out of drug court?

  40. Key Component #7 Ongoing Judicial Interaction • Judge is leader of the team. • Need continuity of relationship between participant and judge. • Ideally, judges would continue from plea through graduation with participants. • Message “Someone in authority cares about me”.

  41. Key Component #7Key Strategies • Judge is expected to attend court. • Judge is expected to attend staffing and policy meetings. • Judge receives written progress reports. • Judge is assigned for 2 years or longer. • In Phase 1, clients appear before judge at least once per week. • In final phase, clients appear at least once per month. • Only the judge can sanction clients.

  42. Key Component #7 Ongoing Judicial Interaction • Drug Courts that have judges stay longer than two years have 3x greater savings (25% v 8%) • The longer the judge spends on the bench the better the client outcomes. • Client outcomes improve in year 2 and beyond (42% v 8%)

  43. Key Component #7 Ongoing Judicial Interaction • Judges who spend at least 3 minutes talking to each participant in court have more than twice the savings (41% v 20%) • Drug Courts that held status hearings weekly or every other week in Phase 1 had 2x cost savings (30% v 19%).

  44. Key Component #8 Program Monitoring • Monitoring and evaluation measure the achievement of program goals and gauge effectiveness. • Measures progress against goals. • Results are used to monitor progress • Results are used to improve operations.

  45. Key Component #8 Program Monitoring • Monitoring and evaluation measure the achievement of program goals and gauge effectiveness. • Does it matter if files are paper or in a database? • Does keeping program stats make a difference? • Do you really need an evaluation? What do you get out of it?

  46. Key Component #8 Key Strategies Routinely collect & report statistics. DC evaluated by independent evaluator. DC maintains an electronic database for monitoring clients. DC uses database to enhance case management. DC maintains paper files for records critical to evaluation. Regular reporting of program statistics has lead to program modifications. Program evaluation has led to change of program operations.

  47. Key Component #8 Program Monitoring • Drug Courts that used paper files instead of electronic databases had less savings. • Free databases-American University • Drug Courts that used evaluation feedback to make modifications had 4 times greater cost savings (44% v 11%) • #sanctions/positive drug tests • Education/employment

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