There should be a clear-cut reason for arrest and subsequently for imprisonment. Persons arrested for illegalities, for instance, drug possession, trespassing, and nonviolent offences are not automatically jailed for their illness might go unattended to medically. Such a happening has taken in places like the Oklahoma City. Individuals found with such offences are placed in courts specifically designed to provide them with specific professional treatment and supervision that they require. Community-based organizations, attorneys and judges come together and coordinate such treatment and ascertain that the offenders stay on track. Courts need to hear cases of low-degree misdemeanors and felonies as well as individuals with drug abuse cases and then make appropriate decisions. In respect of the guilty plea, the offenders get into a treatment plan. There is no point of offering a jail term for them. That will only be work as a drain to the state resources in the long run. After a successful treatment plan, the concerned authorities may opt to stripe off the offence from their records, and that relies on the agreements in the plea. That, therefore, works efficiently as a superior alternate way to incarceration.
According to Haney (2014), t he advancement of alternative courts has been inspired by thorough study and has proven the effectiveness of the courts. A case of a 2000 California law that mandates judges to give nonviolent offenders and substance abuse instead of imprisonment is saving the state approximately $18 million yearly. Further, the program in California reduced the arrests rates for participants who cleared the schedule by 85 percent, and the rates of incarceration and conviction reduced by 83 percent and 77 percent respectively.
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Amongst the 15-20 percent of prisoners possess mental malfunctions and 40 percent and above have participated in the programs and treatment of substance abuse. It is instructive to note that the drug courts can minimize burgeoning rolls in prison by first, diverting offenders and also by the reduction of the likelihood that they might return to the justice system. That ideally should permit them the attractiveness of the state with strangled budget searching for ways of reducing the cost of imprisonment. "It's cheaper to provide outpatient services than to pay for their confinement in prison," explains Strickland. "But more importantly, these are human beings who are worthy of receiving appropriate interventions and treatment" ( Phelps, 2013).
The prisons should adequately be equipped to give the necessary treatment plans or work out a well-crafted release strategy for people with substance abuse issues. If that is the case, then the bandits will be released and shortly later only to be arrested in another stream of violation. That shows that treatment plans are the best option for dealing with people found culpable of drug and substance abuse.
Courts have documented some of the success stories and thus elicited the growing support for mental health and drug courts. "We need to begin to change the way we deal with this problem," says Strickland. "And the way to do that is to empower communities by giving them the financial resources that will enable them to establish these specialty courts" ( Riggs, Parsons, Wei & Drucker, 2014).
The program requires funding to assist in the creation of the substance abuse and mental health courts in different states. Some cases are being taken, and the court continues to accept persons with severe mental illness and such allied circumstances (Rothman, 2017). Different personalities have continued to support the initiative by donating their money. The government had permitted the imitative, but there is no funding.
Before the causalities are released back to the community, the district attorney cross-examines the documents to ascertain that they are free of violence and assessed if they are competent enough to stand in for a trial (Travis, Western & Redburn, 2014). A psychologist does a screening of the individuals with personality inventories, and then an interview for an hour after that a police report review and the prior information on treatment.
The participants have a schedule to operate on for their continuous checkup. They do weekly meetings that perform an assessment of the progress of offenders through the program and attend to cases of co-occurring drug problems. The treatment fundamentally lasts for 12-24 months. During this period, some of the offenders are offered skill-based training that can allow them to earn a living (Travis, Western & Redburn, 2014). That will make them valuable to the society, and possibly make them not to return to the heinous acts that make them liable to imprisonment.
In conclusion, it is censoriously released that our justice system should provide an alternative to incarceration. Everyone that gets involved in the program is positively impacted, and that ranges from family members and court participants to taxpayers and by extension the police. If the persons can achieve effective treatment then most probably, will evade the jail term in the future and can most likely, maintain recovery in their societies. In such a case, rehabilitation shall have occurred, and the person becomes more resource to their communities.
References
Haney, L. A. (2014). Working through Mass Incarceration: Gender and the Politics of Prison Labor from East to West. Signs , 40 (1)
Phelps, M. S. (2013). The paradox of probation: Community supervision in the age of mass incarceration. Law & policy , 35 (1-2), 51-80
Riggs, R., Parsons, J., Wei, Q., & Drucker, E. (2014). From punishment to treatment: a providers’ perspective on the implementation of 2009 Rockefeller Drug Law reforms in New York. Health & Justice , 2 (1), 1-14
Rothman, D. J. (2017). Conscience and convenience: The asylum and its alternatives in progressive America . Routledge.
Travis, J., Western, B., & Redburn, F. S. (2014). The growth of incarceration in the United States: Exploring causes and consequences.
