Transaction Search Form: please type in any of the fields below.
Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
Time: 9:02 pm
Time: 9:02 pm
Results for drug courts (virginia)
2 results foundAuthor: Cheesman, Fred L. Title: Virginia Adult Drug Treatment Courts Impact Study Summary: To date, Virginia has formally implemented 16 adult drug treatment courts. Data from twelve of Virginia’s adult drug treatment courts are included in this report. The twelve adult drug court sites included in this study are: • Charlottesville/Albemarle Adult Drug Court • Chesterfield/Colonial Heights Adult Drug Court • Hampton Adult Drug Court • Henrico Adult Drug Court • Loudoun Adult Drug Court • Newport News Adult Drug Court • Norfolk Adult Drug Court • Portsmouth Adult Drug Court • Rappahannock Regional Adult Drug Court • Roanoke Adult Drug Court • Richmond Adult Drug Court • Staunton Adult Drug Court The other four operational adult drug treatment courts - Tazewell Adult Drug Court, Hopewell/Prince George Adult Drug Court, Bristol Adult Drug Court and Chesapeake Adult Drug Court – were excluded from the study due to limited available data. A total of 1,156 drug court participants were included in the primary analysis of demographics and service level information. For all of the remaining analysis, only the participants that were matched with the comparison group are included (n=972). This report summarizes evaluation findings with respect to several primary issues, such as post-program recidivism, within-program outcomes, and drug treatment court performance measures. Several interesting findings have emerged which are consistent with prevailing drug treatment court trends. Key findings are summarized below. • Virginia drug courts provide a variety of services, substance abuse and ancillary, to participants while at the same time holding them accountable by means of drug testing, sanctions and incentives, and frequent contacts with the court and court staff. • The profile of the typical drug court participant is a young male, unemployed, with limited education, and prior felony, misdemeanor, and drug convictions. This suggests that Virginia’s adult drug courts service high-risk, high-needs offenders. • Virginia drug court participants report cocaine, alcohol, and opiates as their primary drugs of choice. Frequent drug testing indicates that while most participants test positive for illicit drugs at some point in the program, drug use decreases dramatically over time. Lengthy periods of continuous sobriety are observed among drug court participants while enrolled in drug court. Results also indicate that participants are more likely to be employed when they exit their respective programs than when they entered their programs. • About 50 percent of dug court participants successfully graduate their program, very much in-line with national estimates. On average, graduates spend around 1.7 years in their respective programs before graduation, which is slightly higher than recommended best practices. Participants that do not graduate spend about a year in drug court before termination. It is recommended that Virginia drug court programs critically examine their termination policies and strive to reduce their rate of terminations. • Drug court graduates are significantly less likely than terminated clients to recidivate than drug court participants as a whole (combining graduates with non-graduates). • A carefully selected comparison group was used to allow for comparisons between the drug court group, as a whole, and a “business as usual” comparison group. Propensity score matching eliminated or reduced most of the differences between drug court participants and offenders convicted of drug court eligible offenses who did not go to drug court, enabling valid comparisons of program outcomes and impacts described in subsequent analyses. • Drug court participants (graduates and non-graduates combined) are significantly less likely than the propensity score matched comparison group to recidivate while participating in their respective programs. The latter result suggests that Virginia’s drug courts are doing a good job of protecting public safety. • Recidivism was measured using different indices, including arrests, convictions, felony convictions, misdemeanor convictions, and drug offense convictions. When the recidivism rates of drug court participants as a whole (i.e., including both graduates and terminations) are compared to those of the propensity score matched comparison group using all of these indices, drug court participants far out-perform the comparison group. A similar pattern was observed when post-exit recidivism was examined in isolation from in-program recidivism (with the exception of new drug convictions, where no significant difference was observed). These findings, combined with those of the Kaplan-Meier Survival functions, suggest a robust and sustained impact of drug court on recidivism compared to the business-as-usual alternative (probation, jail, and/or prison). These findings need to be confirmed by a multivariate analysis that will control for differences noted between the drug court participants and the comparison group that persisted after propensity score matching. Details: Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, 2012. 64p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April 18, 2013 at: http://ncsc.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/spcts/id/244/rec/55 Year: 2012 Country: United States URL: http://ncsc.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/spcts/id/244/rec/55 Shelf Number: 128406 Keywords: Drug Abuse TreatmentDrug Courts (Virginia)Drug OffendersProblem-Solving Courts |
Author: Cheesman, Fred L. Title: Virginia Adult Drug Treatment Courts: Cost Benefit Analysis Summary: To date, Virginia has formally implemented 16 adult drug treatment courts. In addition, there are eight planning courts that gained approval for implementation following the 2012 Virginia General Assembly as a result of changes to the 2012-2014 budget language and an additional adult drug court that was approved in October 2012 by the Virginia Drug Treatment Court Statewide Advisory Board. Data from 12 of Virginia’s adult drug treatment courts are included in this report. The 12 adult drug court sites included in this study are: • Charlottesville/Albemarle Adult Drug Court • Chesterfield/Colonial Heights Adult Drug Court • Hampton Adult Drug Court • Henrico Adult Drug Court • Loudoun Adult Drug Court • Newport News Adult Drug Court • Norfolk Adult Drug Court • Portsmouth Adult Drug Court • Rappahannock Regional Adult Drug Court • Roanoke Adult Drug Court • Richmond Adult Drug Court • Staunton Adult Drug Court The other four operational adult drug treatment courts – Tazewell Adult Drug Court, Hopewell/Prince George Adult Drug Court, Bristol Adult Drug Court and Chesapeake Adult Drug Court – were excluded from the study due to limited available data. The following report is the second produced as a result of the National Center for State Courts’ study of Virginia’s adult drug courts. The critical finding from the first report was that drug court participants in the sample were significantly less likely to recidivate than the carefully matched “business-as-usual” comparison group and that this reduction in recidivism was a robust and sustained effect. In this, the second report, the following research questions were answered: Key Question 1: What defendant characteristics and program characteristics are associated with the graduation rates and recidivism rates of drug court participants? Key Question 2: Controlling for differences in demographics and criminal history, do drug court participants demonstrate better recidivism outcomes than defendants processed through the traditional criminal justice system? Key Question 3: How much does an adult drug court in Virginia cost per participant? Key Question 4: What is the impact on the criminal justice system of processing defendants through a drug court compared to traditional case processing? Details: Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, 2012. 139p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April 18, 2013 at: http://ncsc.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/spcts/id/245/rec/54 Year: 2012 Country: United States URL: http://ncsc.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/spcts/id/245/rec/54 Shelf Number: 128407 Keywords: Cost Benefit AnalysisDrug Abuse TreatmentDrug Courts (Virginia)Drug OffendersProblem-Solving Courts (Virginia)Recidivism |