Drug Courts Effectiveness: A Critical Analysis

This assignment critically analyzes the effectiveness of Drug Courts in New South Wales (NSW). It examines how these courts address drug addiction and assesses their impact on participant health, the justice system, and financial costs. The report highlights concerns regarding inadequate treatment access, relapse management, program costs, supervision, and the potential for re-offending. It also explores the limited success of Drug Courts in influencing other states due to their shortcomings.

Has 131 - Introducing Crime and Justice

Introduction
The Drug Courts in NSW are established in order to take actions against the people who
have an addiction towards the drugs. These people are presented in Court and are sometimes
punished or sent to medical facilities to reduce their addiction. This report is created to discuss
the fact that Drug Courts are not that effective towards the Drug adductors in terms of the health
of participants, justice, etc.
How Drug Courts s are not effective
It is a fact that Drug Courts s in NSW held up a progressive alternative to incarceration
for the drug crimes, however, they do not decrease criminal justice involved in fact they actually
make the system more punitive towards the drug addiction in terms of drug offenders. They also
raise the significant constitutional and privacy concerns (Mitchell et al. 2012). In order to carry
on with the process, the participants have to sign a waiver which makes them compliance to
share the medical information related to substance abuse treatment to all the members that are
involved in the Drug Courts team.
Drug Courts not effective in terms of health
Drug Courts s in NSW provides the participants with the service that they need but they
often fail to live up to their promises. They inadequately access the needs of people and place
them with inappropriate treatment (McPherson and Sauder 2013). Moreover, in a treatment
setting, the relapse is also met with various intensive services, however, in the Drug Courts
setting it is met with the temporary or permanent removal of the services which is very harmful
to the health of the participants.
Drug Courts not effective regards to cost
In order to take part in the Drug Courts, it becomes costly for the participants who have
spent a lot to come to the Courts and also hire a lawyer to represent those (Sheidow et al. 2012).
The drug (Opioid) cost addiction savings for the participants in NSW are based on the assumed
reductions in terms of the pre-trial detention and recidivism but it is unclear to what extent. Even
if some of the drug (Opioid) cost addiction savings are initiated in the pre-trial, these savings do
not matter when the program cost is accounted for which are always overlooked. The cost
includes the drug test, incarceration for detoxification, net widening, etc.

Drug Courts not effective in supervision of participation
The Drug Courts might not be effective in terms of supervision as the monitoring is done
but it is not that frequent. There is no option for the auditing for the drug offenders in NSW as
after the justice of Court, everything is left for the third parties to monitor (Bruns et al. 2012). In
some of the cases, due to poor treatment, people have been found to develop serious illness as
the court prohibits the trial of new kind of medicines to decrease this addiction and continue with
standard treatments which sometimes is not effective.
Drug Courts not effective in influencing other states
Due to the various pitfalls of the Drug Courts s in terms of the unreliability, less
successful outcomes, limited access towards treatments, increase in costs, public safety and
many more, the other states do not find it appropriate to take efforts in order to set-up a special
court like NSW did for the drug offenders (Messina et al. 2012). The states will have to lay down
different policies especially for the Drug Courts, find the judges, set up structures for the justice
which is not yet effective.
Drug Courts not effective in multi-disciplinary cooperation
The Drug Courts in order to provide proper justice and handle a case require the
participation from the different parties like the government, local police, participants, doctor,
medical team, lawyers, etc. However, the collaboration between all of them in NSW is not yet
established and no one is aware of their exact duty if the case arrives (Alarid et al. 2012).
Drug Courts not effective in stopping re-offending
It has also been analyzed that the Drug Courts s at NSW are not successful in stopping
the offenders to re-offend (Guastaferro 2012). Once the punishment is given, there is no
supervision in terms of the monitoring the treatment or to check whether the offender is actually
taking the medicines to reduce the drug addiction. Sometimes, offenders get released soon and
start using the drugs again.

REFERENCES
Alarid, LF & Montemayor, CD 2012, The effect of parental support on juvenile Drug Courts
completion and post-program recidivism. Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice, Vol. 10 no. (4),
pp.354-369.
Bruns, EJ, Pullmann, MD, Weathers, ES, Wirschem, ML & Murphy, JK 2012, Effects of a
multidisciplinary family treatment Drug Courts on child and family outcomes: Results of a
quasi-experimental study. Child Maltreatment, Vol. 17 no. (3), pp.218-230.
Guastaferro, WP 2012, Using the level of service inventory-revised to improve assessment and
treatment in Drug Courts. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative
Criminology, Vol. 55 no. (5), pp.769-789.
McPherson, CM & Sauder, M 2013, Logics in action: Managing institutional complexity in a
Drug Courts. Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 58 no. (2), pp.165-196.
Messina, N, Calhoun, S, & Warda, U, 2012. Gender-responsive Drug Courts treatment: A
randomized controlled trial. Criminal justice and behaviour, Vol. 39 no. (12), pp.1539-1558.
Mitchell, O, Wilson, DB, Eggers, A. & MacKenzie, DL 2012, Assessing the effectiveness of
Drug Courts s on recidivism: A meta-analytic review of traditional and non-traditional Drug
Courts s. Journal of Criminal Justice, Vol. 40 no. (1), pp.60-71.
Sheidow, AJ, Jayawardhana, J, Bradford, WD, Henggeler, SW and Shapiro, SB, 2012. Money
matters: Cost-effectiveness of Juvenile Drug Courts with and without evidence-based
treatments. Journal of child & adolescent substance abuse, Vol. 20 no. (1), pp.69-90.