Expanding Drug Courts and Alternative Justice Courts in West Virginia: Implementing Innovative and Restorative Justice Practices
Potential Drug Court Solutions for Individuals with Prior Violent Offenses
To further extend the positive impact of alternative justice solutions, West Virginia must consider how to adapt the current drug court model to one that better serves high-risk individuals in the state, like people who have committed violent offenses, while continuing to serve people who may be at high risk for substance use relapse but may have a lower risk for reoffending or for committing violent offenses. One way to accomplish this goal is to analyze and apply existing models of drug courts where this has worked before. The Honolulu Drug Court, presided over by Judge Alm, and its concept of HOPE Probation was presented as a way to incorporate individuals with high-level offenses and a high-risk of recidivism into a successful drug court program. In Judge Alm’s drug court, he focuses on individuals with high-level offenses, including individuals convicted of violent felonies and with a history of violent crime, and places individuals with lower-level offenses into a separate drug court. Additionally, he implements HOPE Probation for certain individuals with high-level offenses, which briefly incarcerates individuals for violating the terms of their drug court probation, usually only a few days. While this may seem harsh and counter-intuitive to one of the goals of drug courts—to reduce incarceration—this method has proved effective both at reducing recidivism and reducing long-term costs of incarceration.
Ideally, Judge Alm’s approach to drug court would be coupled with services offered by the Hartford Community Court, such as social services, job training opportunities, and even specialized programs for certain groups of participants. To truly address and remedy the causes of participants’ criminality, it is essential to provide opportunities to address trauma, mental health struggles, substance use disorder, and financial insecurity. Further, drug courts in West Virginia should remain open to the idea that long-term care for substance use may be necessary for certain participants. As demonstrated by the Philadelphia Community Court, remaining flexible regarding participants’ needs is key. Additionally, remaining flexible with the length of care provided may result in reduced recidivism. Currently in West Virginia, drug courts are offering some of these services now to current drug court participants.
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3. Incorporating Individuals with High-Level Offenses
Looking finally at a drug court in Honolulu, Hawaii, Judge Steven S. Alm recognized a deficiency in drug courts around the country—most drug courts only target individuals with low-level offenses based on exclusionary eligibility criteria, which disqualifies individuals with high-level offenses. However, Judge Alm recognized that helping individuals with high-level offenses, including those with violent offense convictions, likely would be a better use of funding and have a greater impact on the community supervision and prison systems. Judge Alm’s drug court follows three basic principles: focus on high-risk participants, refrain from over-treating lower-risk participants, and separate high- and low-risk participants. Depending on the participant’s needs, the drug court program is sometimes combined with Hawaii’s Opportunity Probation with Enforcement (HOPE Probation). HOPE Probation is a form of procedural justice that results in an arrest of a probationer and a proportional jail sentence for each violation; HOPE Probation differs from typical Hawaii probation because a single probation violation usually does not result in any penal consequences.
In the drug court, the graduation rate of high-risk participants compared to low-risk participants has increased, and millions of dollars that would have been spent on incarceration have been saved. But most importantly, the participants were afforded the opportunity to be rehabilitated rather than serve a merely retributivist sentence and face the collateral consequences that stem from incarceration. Further, the even higher-risk drug court participants that originally participated in HOPE Probation did not have a higher recidivism rate than lower-risk pretrial drug court participants. The data from the Hawaii drug court indicates that allowing individuals with high-level offenses, including those who have committed violent offenses, to participate in a drug court model leads to similar success as individuals with low-level offenses.
