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Drug Court and Funding Issues in New Jersey

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Drug Court and Funding Problems in New Jersey

                Governor Christie recently passed legislation which provides 4.5 million in funding to state drug court(s).  Before I get into the issues this presents, I will give a brief overview of what Drug Court is in the State of New Jersey.  Drug Court is a program offered to people facing felonies in Superior Court.  In those cases, the defendants are almost always facing a state prison sentence.  If accepted into the Drug Court program, the defendant does not have to serve their state prison sentence.  Instead, they participate in the Drug Court Program which involves them following and completing all recommendations for in-patient and outpatient treatment.  They are also subjected to random urine screening, and other requirements such as employment and attendance of NA and AA meetings.  If they successfully complete Drug Court, which usually is 4-5 years, they do not have to serve any state prison time.  If they violate the conditions of drug court and ultimately do not complete the program, they have to serve a state prison sentence.
                Recently, I had a discussion with various people responsible for implicating and supervising drug court about a client of mine, but also about the program in general.  The problem that many of them see is that the program is designed to promote recovery, to offer addiction resources to people accused and/or convicted of drug related crimes.  Unfortunately, too often than not, people’s only motive for applying for drug court is to avoid state prison.  People that are accepted into drug court with that as their motive essentially have no chance of living up to the stringent requirements in the program and ultimately completing the program. 
                Many clients have told me that drug court is a “set up”.  My response to that statement is always the same, “If you want to continue to get high, it is a set up.”  I will be honest and recognize that Drug Court asks a lot of its participants.  But I cannot state that I have a problem with that. Recovery is work, it is not easy.  What I have seen, in my personal life and my professional life, is that people cannot maintain any kind of long term recovery without putting the work in.  If someone is not willing, if they are not ready to “Do anything it takes to stay clean”, then the program will not work.  They will fail and ultimately end up in state prison. 
               Everyday I am in Municipal Court you see the early stages of addiction and the legal consequences.  It starts with charges like petty thefts, DWIs, minor drug possession charges. The next progression is on to Superior Court.  Initially, addicts may be fortunate enough to avoid any jail time through probation or diversionary programs that the Superior Court offers.  Until the underlying issue is addressed, their addiction, these are all just temporary fixes and as the addiction progresses, the criminal behaviors will continue and almost always gets worse.  I have talked with judges and probation officers, and many of them have the same problem. They recognize a person needs treatment, they need help with their addiction, but they do not have the resources to provide them.
             In one of my recent cases, I had a court order from a judge for a client that is on probation, and the order stated that my client must get some level of treatment to address his issues with addiction or he was going to violate him and send him to jail.  I called multiple state facilities and sent them over the court order, and none of that forced their hand.  As I was told, there is no legislation that states that a treatment center must admit someone if it is court ordered by a judge.  Simply put, they did not have a bed for him. I eventually found him out-patient treatment on my own.  The biggest problem is that it took over a month to find the treatment, and secondly, he needed a higher level of care, we just could not get him in anywhere. 
                I am not against funding drug court.  I am proud that my state is attempting to promote rehabilitation instead of incarceration.  However, there needs to be more resources available for people before their alleged crimes elevate to the level that drug court admission requires.  At that point, they have committed a felony, and in most cases multiple ones.  I can say from personal experience, that it was not there first contact with the legal system, nor was it the first time that someone, such as a judge or probation officer, identified that they were an addict and that they needed help. 
                Drug Court has contracts with many state facilities.  These facilities reserve beds and resources for their program.  The court can literally order these people into treatment.  I am never for forcing anyone to get help, that method never works.  If someone is not willing, all the resources in the world will not help.  But we need to develop a system where municipal court judges, probation officers, can provide people with the help they need.  We need a system that if someone wants help, wants to treat the underlying addiction issues, they can get that help.  This will require a different system, more funding, more resources.   The same type of resources that drug court provides need to be offered to municipal courts and county probation offices. 
 

 

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