Judged A Success
The average drug-dependent criminal commits some 200 felonies a year to support his habit. Jail terms interrupt but don’t end the pattern. Hoping to break the cycle, Spokane County established a drug court in 1995. There, nonviolent drug offenders may plead guilty and enter an extended treatment program. They must make restitution to their victims, appear regularly in court and submit to a year or more of monitoring. If they can’t cut it, they go to jail. No trial. No appeal. The expense — about one-tenth of what it costs to keep an offender in prison — has been borne by federal grants, but they expire June 30. Spokane County commissioners have agreed to fund the program at least through this year. Superior Court Judge Tari S. Eitzen, who succeeded Judge James Murphy as drug court judge in January, was interviewed recently by interactive editor Doug Floyd. An excerpt appears below.
What excites you about drug court?
Drug court is so different from everything else that judges do. The whole concept revolves around working as a team instead of the judge being the autocrat in the courtroom. The drug court judge is a member of the team and has the final say but sits down and takes into account the information the other people on the team have about this individual and this offense.
Normally when we have somebody in court they’re brought in, they enter their plea, I get a brief synopsis from both sides about what they think I should do. I sentence them and it’s just bam, bam, bam, one after another, all day long. And I really don’t know a lot about any of those people.
But in drug court I can ask any questions I want with no lawyer to filter it. I can really find out about that person as a human being. Not only can I get more information about that person, I also have all of these resources available and I can help with the advice of the treatment provider and Department of Corrections people who’ve been to their home and the professionals and the public defender. I can tailor a program and a sanction, and rewards. I can do positive and negative, consequences and rewards, to match that person. To me that’s pretty exciting.
Do you get emotionally invested?
I have to expose more of myself and I ask these people to expose more of themselves.
I have to convey to each of these people that I care about each of them as people, that they’re more than case numbers. I want them to be successful at becoming a contributing member of our community where we both live and I want them to have a meaningful life and I want them not to commit another crime.
You’re always on that fine line, I think, of being too familiar or too formal. They have to see the human side of you and know that you really have a personal regard for them. But on the other hand they have to have a realistic expectation that if they don’t comply with the program the consequence is certain. It’s going to happen. It’s going to be consistent.
It’s like parenting in a way. You’re saying to these people I care for you as human beings. But if you don’t comply with the rules that we all have to live with to be in this family or this community, then there has to be a consequence for that.
When you have all these drug court participants in here at the same time, they see how you deal with everybody and they need to know you are going to be consistent and fair with everybody, that everybody is following the same rules and everybody gets the same consequences for the same behavior, and yet everything is specifically tailored for that individual. That’s a big burden.
How do you know when you’re walking that line?
I just have to feel my way. I rely on the team and I ask them a lot during the hour that we have before we go out in drug court. We always have a meeting. We go over each and every person who’s going to appear in drug court that day. And I always say what do you think I should do? What do you think the consequences should be therapeutically? What should I say in response to this event that happened this week? For this person what do you think is going to work? It’s a team concept.
Do you worry about being a pushover?
The way I am in court is always a little bit different maybe from a lot of other judges. I’m a little more curious about people as people, and I’m a little bit more interested in them as human beings. That doesn’t mean I’m going to be any less firm in the decisions I make.
How does your background as a social worker prepare you for this?
Maybe a little more concerned that I take into account people’s emotional status. Being rude to somebody in a courtroom is unnecessarily cruel. If I’m going to sentence somebody to a long sentence why is it necessary that I degrade them? But I don’t see trying to treat everyone with dignity makes any judge a pushover.
What have been the most encouraging parts of the experience?
One is I’m almost overwhelmed by how the drug court team accepted me as the new judge. The judge doesn’t have a chance very often to have a close relationship with anybody professionally. But in this concept I can be more myself and have a different relationship with the drug court team than I can have with attorneys in general in the workplace.
The second thing is the participants. One of the most important things about drug court is the participants’ ability to form a relationship with the judge. They need to want to please you. They have to want to come and tell you the good, the bad and trust you. These people had that relationship with Judge Murphy for three years. That was their judge, that was the person they trusted.
That’s really an important part of drug court, and all of a sudden here’s this new judge.
I’m a female and they’re not used to that. I have a different way of dealing with people. They’re not used to that. I’ve got a different courtroom. Even little things like that can throw people off.
You have some people who are on shaky ground here. I’ve felt like they’ve been really accepting of that change. It probably speaks volumes about the rest of the drug court team who’ve provided the stability during the transition.
Is there a down side?
It’s incredibly draining. On Mondays we’ll start at noon and have a team meeting for the whole drug court and then from 1 or 1:30 we’ll have a meeting of this team where we’ll go over every single person who’s going to appear. And then we’ll go into court at 3 and a couple of times we’ve gone until 6. Well, that’s fine, I can do that. But on the emotional level it’s really stressful because the whole time I’m out there I’m worrying, I don’t want to ask this person the wrong question. You’re dealing with therapeutic issues too, not just legal issues. Maybe there’s something that we’ve talked about as a team that we’ve decided wouldn’t be a good thing therapeutically to bring up in front of the whole group. What if I don’t make the right note and I say something that we’ve agreed won’t be said out there? And I’ve got 30 people and I’ve got all these pages of notes.
It’s just the most draining thing I’ve done in years emotionally. And not only because of those things but some of the things that these people say. You can feel the weight of their lives sometimes.
For people who’ve been in court a few times as defendants this is a different climate. You ask people, “Will you please come back in 30 days?” Where does that come from?
That’s just me. The first day one participant said, “Does that mean I have a choice?” and I said, “No, I’m just being nice,” and everybody laughed. They know, and I tell them, “If you’re not here there’ll be a warrant issued for your arrest.” Part of it is civility. We’re trying to teach people respect for one another.
What good is drug court doing?
Recidivism figures show that all across the country it makes a tremendous difference. People who participate in drug court, even those who don’t successfully complete the program, have much lower recidivism rates — and I don’t mean just reusing drugs, I mean committing crimes.
We have 2 million people in this country in prisons. We have 400,000 people in prisons for drug offenses. I would say 75 percent at least of the people I see in pleas and sentencings are either drug offenses, property crimes committed on drugs, property crimes or other crimes committed while looking for drugs, trying to get something to buy drugs. I think if we eliminated illicit use of illegal drugs we could probably eliminate 75 percent of the crime.
Tell me about some of the changes you’ve seen in people.
There’s a lady who started in drug court in early January when I did. She’s a little tiny thing, 5-foot-2. She weighs 103. She’s just cute as a bug — looks healthy, clear skin, shiny hair, sparkly eyes, perky, pleasant disposition, energetic.
Two months ago when she came in for her first appearance she was 87 pounds, and she did not look good at all. Extremely unhealthy in every way, attitude and physically. Just to see the change in her and to hear her tell how that feels was pretty uplifting. I think we may have saved her life.