Substance Abuse

The most extensive study of drug courts-a five-year examination of 23 courts and six comparison jurisdictions in eight states—found that these court programs can significantly decrease drug use and criminal behavior, with positive outcomes ramping upward as participants sensed their judge treated them more fairly, showed greater respect and interest in them, and gave them more chances to talk during courtroom proceedings.

This presentation recaps the findings from the Multi-Site Adult Drug Court Evaluation and highlights implications of these findings for both drug court practice and policy. Drug courts are effective at reducing crime and drug use and the role of the drug court judge is particularly important in this change process. Specific recommendations are given related to judicial status hearings and judicial behaviors, drug court eligibility and case processing, case management, and more.

Volume 1 from the National Institute of Justice's Multi–site Adult Drug Court Evaluation provides information about the study’s context and objectives; a review of the literature; a description of the research design, data collection, and analytic strategies; and a description of the characteristics of study participants. The outcome evaluation included 1,781 offenders across 23 drug court and six comparison sites which represented several alternative ways the criminal justice system works with drug–involved offenders in jurisdictions without drug courts. Volume 1 also provides lessons learned in recruiting and retaining drug– and criminal justice involved–offenders in longitudinal survey research.

Volume 2 from the National Institute of Justice's Multi–site Adult Drug Court Evaluation provides information from 380 adult drug courts surveyed in 2004. It describes drug court program characteristics and operations, such as: most courts operate small programs with less than 50 participants; more than half of courts require both an eligible charge and a clinical assessment for participants to enroll; and courts that have been in operation for a longer time more often use a diversion model, whereby clients enroll in the program before entering pleas, than do younger courts. Drug courts were also classified into profiles of programming characteristics.

Volume 3 from the National Institute of Justice's Multi–site Adult Drug Court Evaluation (MADCE) provides process evaluation findings about the 23 drug courts included in the MADCE outcome evaluation, and information about participant receipt of program services including drug court supervision (contact with judges and attorneys; case management; drug testing; and sanctions and incentives) and treatment. It also describes drug court participants' outcomes related to offender attitudes and to drug court retention. Participants' perceptions of procedural justice, distributive justice, and severity of the sentence to be imposed upon drug court failure significantly predicted program compliance, criminal behavior, and drug use at follow–up.

Volume 4 from the National Institute of Justice's Multi–site Adult Drug Court Evaluation (MADCE) provides findings from the outcome evaluation answering the questions, "do drug courts work", "for whom do drug courts work," and "what are the mechanisms by which drug courts work", as well as provides findings from the cost–benefit study. The outcome evaluation found that drug courts prevent crime and substance use and work equally well for most participant subgroups. Effects are greatest among participants whose judges who spend time with them, support them, and treat them with respect. Implications for practice, policy, and future research are also discussed.

The National Institute of Justice's Multi-site Adult Drug Court Evaluation (MADCE) tested whether drug courts reduce drug use, crime, and associated problems; assessed how drug courts work and for whom; examined how changes in participant attitudes and behaviors explain effectiveness; and determined whether drug courts generate cost savings. The evaluation found that drug courts prevent crime and substance use and work equally well for most participant subgroups. Effects are greatest among participants whose judges who spend time with them, support them, and treat them with respect. Methodology and implications for policy and practice are also discussed.

More than a dozen cost-benefit analyses have been conducted on drug courts in the last decade. We build on these findings and extend them in several ways: 1) a larger sample allows us to draw inferences from a large sample of individuals (nearly 1,800) and courts (23); 2) survey data on a number of domains which have never been included in past analyses (such as employment, hospital use, homeless shelter use, mental health treatment, and many more) increases the range of program costs and benefits considered; 3) we employ statistical techniques less common in criminal justice cost-benefit analyses, although not new, to identify individual characteristics which make drug court most cost-effective; and 4) we separately analyze each drug court’s cost effectiveness to draw inferences about which drug courts are and are not cost effective under different combinations of price structures, program design, and offender population characteristics