Good Courts

HOW INNOVATIVE JUDGES AND ATTORNEYS ARE TRANSFORMING AMERICAN COURTS Public confidence in American criminal courts is at an all-time low. Victims, communities, and even offenders view courts as unable to respond adequately to complex social and legal problems including drugs, prostitution, domestic violence, and quality-of-life crime. Even many judges and attorneys think that the courts produce assembly-line justice. Increasingly embraced by even the most hard-on-crimes jurists, problem-solving courts offer an effective alternative. As documented by Greg Berman and John Feinblatt - both of whom were instrumental in setting up New York's Midtown Community Court and Red Hook Community Justice Center, two of the nation's premier models for problem-solving justice - these alternative courts re-engineer the way everyday crime is addressed by focusing on the underlying problems that being people into the criminal justice system to being with. features, in addition to the Midtown and Red Hook models, an in-depth look at Oregon's Portland Community Court and reviews the growing body of evidence that the problem-solving approach to justice is indeed producing positive results around the country. Drug-addicted offenders who successfully complete treatment in problem-solving courts are 71 per cent less likely to be rearrested in New York State alone, it is estimated that problem-solving drug courts have saved more than USD254 million in incarceration costs