Automation of the Drug Court System These

Automation of the Drug Court System

These are specially formed courts whose jurisdiction involves offenders majorly with drug related problems. Drug courts are primarily an alternative to the normal prison, or the detention camps. The criminal justice system in drug courts works hand in hand with the treatment systems. The main objective of the drug courts is to provide the offender with the necessary support towards recovery, to maintain their stay during recovery and afterwards to enable them lead a life that is productive to the society.

Drug courts represent a unique approach to managing drug-related cases. This approach is a fairly recent phenomenon for the justice system. It grew out of problems created for the justice system, and the communities it serves, when the growth of drug-related arrests threatened to overwhelm the system in the early 1990s.

There is an urgent need to carry out urgent mitigation measures; this is because this menace has various implications to various spheres of a country including political, economic and social stability. It creates social economic hardships hence increasing misery which increases crime, violence' and a drain on human material resources. There has been an increase in the use and trafficking of illicit drugs. Generally this poses dangers in the public health, the quality of life, and has also great implications for the political, economic and social stability of this country.

There have been immense activities aimed at improving drug court research; research on information technology has been ongoing since the early days of the drug court movement. There have been promising evaluation results which have helped spur the creation of drug courts, which now number more than 1,500 nationally.

Methodology

The study questioned the entire distribution of known drug courts in the United States to develop an in depth assessment of the courts. This was representative of the actual situation on the ground in scope and broadly reflective of all drug courts regardless of its background and other characteristics. The research methodology that was undertaken in this study included research design, assessment areas, drug court characteristics, statistical analysis, and scope

Findings

The survey found that generally many drug courts have no automation, also the automation support being provided to drug courts by existing computer systems is inadequate, such that drug court operations are hampered in many ways. A strong correlation was found between automation and the time it takes for the drug court judge to receive failed drug test results. The difficulty of linking to other systems was another barrier to automation. Less than 20% of the surveyed courts reported that they have completed the necessary process required in automation to produce reports needed for overall program evaluation. The drug courts overwhelmingly expressed a desire for additional education and training to deal with evaluation and management information systems. Among the recommendations are that specialized educational programs be developed to address high-priority issues and that technical assistance address areas identified as needing special attention.