Drugs

By Greg Berman and John Feinblatt

American criminal courts are in desperate need of reform. Public confidence in justice is at an all-time low. Victims, communities and even offenders see courts as unable to respond effectively to complex social and legal problems like drugs, domestic violence and quality-of-life crime. Even many judges and attorneys think that the courts produce assembly line justice.

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By Robert V. Wolf

A review of nine practical strategies to break down the conceptual and in some cases practical barriers that separate specialized courts from each other and the world of problem-solving from traditional courts.

By Robert V. Wolf

An in-depth look at the 10 projects awarded grants under the Bureau of Justice Assistance's Community-Based Problem-Solving Criminal Justice Initiative.

Produced by the American Judges Association, this white paper contends that judges can improve public satisfaction with the courts by improving perceptions of procedural fairness. It summarizes key research and makes recommendations for judges, courts, court leaders, and others.

http://aja.ncsc.dni.us/htdocs/AJAWhitePaper9-26-07.pdf

By Greg Berman, Phillip Bowen and Adam Mansky

The National Association of Probation Executives published this paper on failure. The product of semi-structured interviews with criminal justice experts, researchers and practitioners, as well as a review of the literature on failure, it seeks to provoke debate as to why some criminal justice reforms work and why some do not.

By Greg Berman

An edited transcript from a day-long roundtable that brought together judges, court administrators, probation officials, prosecutors, police chiefs and defense attorneys from across the country to discuss lessons they have learned from projects that did not succeed.

Theron Bowman began his law enforcement career with the Arlington Police Department in Arlington, Texas—a city of over 300,000—nearly 25 years ago, just before its community policing program began. He has been chief of police since 1999. In January 2007, he participated in a roundtable, assembled by the Center for Court Innovation and the Bureau of Justice Assistance, to discuss failure and innovation in criminal justice, a transcript of which is scheduled to be published in the first issue of the Journal of Court Innovation in the fall of 2007.

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Cass County District Court Judge John P. Smith and Leech Lake Tribal Court Chief Judge Korey Wahwassuck have worked together since 2006 presiding over the post-conviction, post-sentencing Driving While Intoxicated Court in Cass County, Minnesota. In May 2007 they spoke with Center for Court Innovation staff about the innovative, collaborative program.

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The second workshop for the Community Based Problem-Solving Criminal Justice Initiative was held in Atlanta on May 23 and 24, 2007. Here are some photos from the event.

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This Toolkit offers a blueprint for using the problem-solving approach, a form of differentiated case management for cases involving recurring contacts with the justice system due to underlying medical and social problems.

http://www.ncsconline.org/D_Research/Documents/ProbSolvJustTool.pdf