There's another problem with drug courts which I think is a bit more serious. Given the amount of judicial and supervision time required for a drug court, the c

There's another problem with drug courts which I think is a bit more serious. Given the amount of judicial and supervision time required for a drug court, the courts tend to be very selective as to who can be diverted into that process. They prefer young people with no prior history and those individuals are put through a very stringent process with the threat of going to jail or prison for noncompliance. The rub here is that that group of people (young, nonviolent first-time offenders) tend not to reoffend anyway. In that light, these courts take credit for putting someone through this process who would have been just as likely to never see the court again if she or he had just been issued a fine or given a stern talking-to. For this group, just being in jail for a night is enough to stop (or never get caught again). What makes this sadder, I think, is that there are many other people in the system that would benefit from this kind of specialized attention from judges and probation officers. The success rate for that group would be much lower, but the individual successes would be more impressive. They just get put into prison over and over until all they can do is be a criminal.