Alternative courts gain ground for petty criminals

[Lone_Star_Dem]

Source: USA Today

Cities and counties increasingly are creating innovative community courts to deal with the growing number of habitual petty criminals that police call "frequent fliers."

Criminals who are arrested repeatedly for crimes such as public drunkenness, trespassing and panhandling are crowding jails and sapping police resources, officials say. The cost of handling small-time criminals who cycle in and out of jail is becoming a more pressing problem for communities as budgets tighten and jail populations swell.

The new courts sentence "frequent fliers" to treatment plans and social services, such as mental health and substance abuse treatment, instead of jail.

"It's the new frontier," says Amy Solomon, who studies criminal justice at The Urban Institute in Washington. "There is a new realization and recognition" that incarceration is not the best solution. "I think it'll grow and continue to pick up."

Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-09-frequentfliers_N.htm?csp=1

[mikelgb]

1. hmm, how about: no harm, no foul?

[Lone_Star_Dem]

5. In some cases of mental illness the harm is in not providing treatment for the person

The programs such as this which I am familiar with help with medical and mental health programs for those who are in need. Rather than the old method of just processing them in and then dumping them back on the streets.

Keeping a homeless/mentally ill person in a revolving door pattern at the local jail does nothing to help the situation long term.

[tridim]

2. What's more petty? Public drunkenness or private herb smoking?

[no_hypocrisy]

3. A/k/a "disorderly conduct".

[rug]

4. In NY there are Drug Courts to get people off drugs and Mental Health Courts to get people on drugs.

[High Plains]

6. Drug courts are better than imprisonment, but...

I think they should only be used in cases where the drug use has caused some sort of problem, as is done with people who get caught driving drunk. Having to go through drug court just for being caught with drugs is unjustifiable.

Drug courts are also a weird sort of perversion of medicine. The theory is that addiction is a disease. For what other disease are you punished if you relapse?

Still, as I said, it beats going to prison.

[bean fidhleir]

8. The drug laws are remnants of the view that we are all the property of the monarch

or, in the republican case, the state. So punishment for sickness is "really" punishment for not taking due care of the king's property.

[Fredda Weinberg]

9. Well, I know something about the subject. In fact, these systems

are the only place where we pull together family services, mental health as well as justice system records to offer a full treatment option. Wasn't easy to implement, but it was worth getting all those agencies to cooperate in Brooklyn.

Prison? That's not the point ... functioning within society is and these are individuals who have demonstrated that they can't handle their addictions. Don't identify too strongly until you've seen these case files. I have.

[High Plains]

10. What you describe is a sad commentary on our society.

That we leave it to the criminal justice system, a punitive system, to deal with our addicted and mentally ill. As I said, it beats prison, but still leaves much to be desired.

And as I said, drug courts may be appropriate for some people. They are certainly not an appropriate blanket response to drug possession charges.

Speaking of prison, the number of drug war POWs now exceeds half a million and is closing in on 600,000.

[Fredda Weinberg]

11. Sad? I wasn't when I worked w/Center for Court Innovation.

In fact, I'm proud of what NYS accomplished and they were, in turn, generous w/their praise for my technical contribution. The system was designed to be an alternative to the penal system and it's your problem that you can't keep the two separate. They are.

[High Plains]

12. If it keeps people out of prison who don't need to be there, it's a good thing.

The sad thing is that we don't seem to give a shit about these people until they get in trouble for something. Where is the prophylactic mental health care, where is the support for poor families? It seems like we don't have a dime for that stuff, but billions for prison cells.

[Fredda Weinberg]

13. You're getting warmer. Incarceration is considered a failure in the drug court

And it's all about bringing together the various agencies, including mental health and counseling. Everything you say it should have ... it does.

So I'm pleased w/the system and encourage it, despite the obvious and latent problems. It's earned our support.

[Carnea]

7. Now thats Funny NT