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Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Ind. Courts - Vanderburgh County Drug Court findings
"Drug court provides second chance" is the headline to a story today by Evansville Courier & Press reporter Kate Braser. Some quotes:
About a year ago, the Indiana Judicial Center hired a research group to evaluate state adult drug courts. The group studied participants who entered Vanderburgh County Drug Court from April 2002 to June 2005. That group was compared to a group charged with crimes eligible for drug court but who never participated.Significant findings included the following:
- The local drug court sample was rearrested 17 percent fewer times than the comparison group.
- The criminal justice cost per drug court participant was $6,152.71 versus $12,824 for the comparison group. Most of those savings came from prison and probation time.
- The average cost to the Indiana Department of Correction for each drug court participant was $5,301 versus $10,603 for the comparison group.
[Vanderburgh Superior Court Judge Wayne] Trockman is now taking those findings to legislators.
"I am trying to convince the state to divert money to treatment in drug courts," he said, explaining funding now comes from a variety of sources. "Up until now, we didn't have hard data to show this was working. We just had anecdotes."
The local program targets "hard-core addicts," according to Debbie Mowbray, director of the Vanderburgh County Day Reporting Drug Court.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on December 5, 2006 06:44 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts