Today’s episode will be an education, at least it was for me!
We do something a little different. We have Judge Amber with us sharing about the Drug Wellness Court she presides over!
I have limited exposure or understanding of Drug Wellness Court, and I love introducing you to all types of stories and resources. Today will be no different.
Meet Judge Amber, and let’s go to court!
See full transcript below.
00:01
You’re listening to the Embrace Family Podcast, a place for real conversations with people who love someone with the disease of addiction. Now here is your host, Margaret Swift Thompson.
Intro: Welcome back! Today I have learned a lot and I hope you will feel the same way after listening to the episode. I sat in my closet recording this interview as I always do with a wonderful judge from Pennsylvania, as she recorded from her juror’s restroom. Judge Amber shares about her experience being the presider over a Drug Wellness Court. Meet Judge Amber Craft.
The Embrace Family Recovery Podcast
Margaret 01:15
I’m excited to introduce you Amber to my audience because I’ve never had anyone on from the judicial or legal system. And I think it’s gonna be a really interesting education for people to understand more about the resources that you offer. You do probably a much better job than I do, of introducing yourself and what exactly you do in Pennsylvania.
Judge Amber Craft 01:38
My name is Amber Craft, and I’m a judge in Pennsylvania. Generally, I’m a criminal trial court judge. So, I would sit and hear criminal trials, which I think everyone is familiar with, you know, what you see on TV, although it’s not like that. Exactly. But that’s what I do. But I also preside over two treatment courts in our county, I preside over our Drug Wellness Court, and our Veterans Wellness Courts. They’re both treatment courts.
Margaret 02:08
So, I have heard the term drug court before, but until we chatted, I didn’t know the term treatment courts. So, explain to the listeners who by the way, are people who love someone with the disease of addiction, so they may have the opportunity to utilize these resources with their loved ones. So, what exactly is treatment court?
Judge Amber Craft 02:27
Well what treatment court is it’s a diversionary court. So, I’ll just give you an example of how the system would work for someone. So, someone comes into the criminal justice system, and I would say typically, are treatment court participants for drug court are someone who has accumulated a decent criminal record, a lot of times they get caught dealing a decent amount of whatever.
So, their sentencing guidelines would be significant, let’s say for example, they might be looking at a year to five years in prison. So rather than going into prison, they’re diverted into a treatment court, because what we found statistically based on evidentiary research, and what they call best evidence, when we put people in jail, we don’t help them. We give them treatment for drug and alcohol addiction or mental health issues, we see much better results in recidivism and recidivism means people coming back into the system.
So basically, what we find is prison doesn’t work. Treatment does. So rather than sending these people to prison, we’re gonna give them treatment, in the hopes that they will change the trajectory of where they’re going. And the Wellness Courts are extremely effective, in doing that. We have very high rate of graduates, and our graduates and their recidivism rates are very low. I mean, I can talk the talk about the numbers and the statistics. But at the end of the day, I get to watch people change their lives on a daily basis in treatment court.
Margaret 04:06
How wonderful that must be. I wonder about the language I would use around this is if I’m hearing you correctly, the people who are in your treatment court are people who have the disease of addiction and or mental health issues concurrent. And they are people whose symptoms of their addiction end up doing criminal activity. So, in order to survive in a disease, they end up doing activities that are criminal in the legal system. Does anybody get to participate in treatment court or is it a specific set of people?
Judge Amber Craft 04:47
Well, first of all, they have to be nonviolent offenders. So typically, the people we see are people who have retail thefts, which makes sense they’re stealing things to feed their addictions. Or people who sell drugs to feed their addiction, and not just anyone can participate, you have to apply. And then our district attorney is the one who is the gatekeeper of the program. He gets to decide who comes in and who doesn’t come in. And typically, we’re looking for people who are high risk and high need. People who are high risk for reoffending and high need, meaning they need drug and alcohol or mental health treatment or both. So that’s what we’re looking for people with nonviolent offenses who meet that criteria. And then it’s up to the district attorney to open the gate or close the gate, depending on whatever he’s looking at on that application.
Margaret 05:36
So, what types of services would one get if they did get accepted into the program? Is that a whole person thing? Is it just around addiction, what types of services?
Judge Amber Craft 05:47
It’s a whole person thing. So, the way treatment court works is we have a team. And we meet every single week, I spend my entire day on Thursday, doing drug court the whole day from start to finish. And it’s a very long day, we have a district attorney on our team. And she’s actually wonderful, she’s very experienced, and very committed to treatment court. We have a public defender, someone to represent the legal needs of the defendant who’s in the program, we have a mental health case manager, we have a drug and alcohol case manager, we have probation officers. And then we have a probation coordinator, the person who kind of coordinates this whole group of people. We also have a representative who comes in from the prison. And he runs one of the prison kind of drug court programs. And oftentimes, we used to have someone who were kind of working on bringing someone back in, who is in recovery, and now works in the treatment field, to kind of give us the perspective of someone in recovery, because most of the people in our team are not. And we want to be able to have that.
So, we all get together, we meet. We have two hours that we spend talking about everybody, how’s so and so doing, how so and so doing? So, the case managers, they’re the ones that are going to say, okay, this person, we did a level of care assessment, and they need inpatient treatment. And then we have another person, okay, they need outpatient. And so, you know, we have somebody who assesses what level of care they need. Typically, we’re addressing stabilizing someone with their recovery in their addiction first, because a lot of times, you know, we kind of have to get that stable. And then we delve a little bit more into the mental health. And we don’t do a trauma screening right away, because we find that people don’t trust us at all at the beginning. So, we find that in later phases, the treatment court, we assess trauma, and once somebody’s stable, maybe digging a little bit more into that, because, as I’m sure you know, there’s a huge correlation between those two things.
Margaret 07:47
Which brings up an interesting question, Amber, just so the audience knows, I see a person in your stature as a very, you know, high achieving successful, human being who I would hold in great respect. And in your courtroom, I would imagine that would be the case. And you’re sitting kindly enough in this interview in your jury bathroom, which is quite humbling to know that you would take the time out of your busy schedule, and actually sit in a restroom and do the interview. So, thank you for that. The question that it brings up is, you know, I haven’t been in trouble with the law, it would be not a place I would necessarily feel comfortable walking into. And I certainly imagine that, as a person who has some sort of criminal connection to a court to flip to believing that you’re there to help them get help, not to punish them would be a big trust issue.
Judge Amber Craft 08:39
It’s a hurdle.
So, there’s a couple things that happen with respect to that transformation to trust from fearing the criminal justice system to trusting it. And the first thing that happens is people come in to drug court to avoid jail. They don’t come into drug court, typically, because they’re ready for recovery, they’re in we’ll say, generously the pre contemplative stage of change, correct? And they’re like, I just, I don’t want to go to jail. So, I’m gonna go do this, and I’m gonna go do what they told me to do. And I’m gonna get out of jail. And I’ll tell them that when they walk in my court member, like, I know, that’s why you’re here. And I’m okay with that. Because I’m here to change your perception of how this whole thing works. The other thing that is an incentive for people coming in, besides changing their lives, which is my purpose, they get a reduction in their charge. So, when someone comes into the court, they enter a plea, they accept responsibility for the crime. And then if they successfully complete the wellness court, their felonies are reduced to a misdemeanor, so felony is your highest level of crime, they’re reduced to misdemeanors, and the misdemeanors are dismissed. So, you avoid jail, and you get a charge reduction. So, people come in and they’re like, this is what I want. And we’re like, okay, that’s, that’s a good reason for you to come in.
And then we bombard them with a lot of things, and we keep them really busy, they get really overwhelmed, they have to go to a meeting every day, they have to go to treatment, they have to meet with their probation officers. And you know, we’ve got multiple people monitoring all of these things. And what I tell participants, when they come to the treatment court, there’s only two things that I really expected of you in the beginning, you have to be honest with me, because if you’re not honest with me, I cannot help you. If you relapse, if you screw up, you’re much better off telling me than not telling me. And you got to show up. Those are the two things that we’re kind of looking for at the beginning.
And no one wants to be honest with me in the beginning. And eventually they realize, one of the things that’s beautiful about the court, we call it the theater of the court, is they see what happens to people who are honest, and people who are dishonest. But we’re also again, we’re a treatment court team. So, we expect deceptive, manipulative behavior in the beginning, we expect that, we work with that, we try to get them in treatment, we build trust relationships. And, you know, it’s very much a behavior modification kind of system that we have, we have certain sanctions that we use, and we try to reward behavior in a positive way more than we sanction behavior in a negative way.
So, every week in court, you know, I’m focused on their behavior that week, and really, really praising them if they’re doing great and not doing so great trying to figure out what’s going on. And then eventually, those people that come in, to avoid jail, they see their lives stabilize, they rebuild relationships with their families, they hold steady jobs, they get their license back, or, you know, whatever happens, and all of a sudden, they’re like, wait a minute, I’m turning into a productive member of society, I, I like this. And before you know it, typically around two years, about the two-year mark is when we see people graduate, like I don’t want to say they could care less about the reduction in charge. But there’s things that motivate them in the beginning are, are minimal compared to what they’re achieving by the time they graduate from the program. So that’s what I get to see. They come for the wrong reasons. They stay for the right reasons. And it’s beautiful.
Margaret 12:12
They get a life they didn’t dream possible; I’m guessing at the end of it.
12:18
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Margaret 13:20
Similar to treatment that isn’t related to court, you know, when you watch someone come into treatment, there’s some ouch that they’re not able to tolerate. There’s some consequence, some loss, some issue, and then with time in recovery, gain a sense of integrity and feel better about themselves. And then that builds upon itself.
Amber: Absolutely.
Margaret: That sounds like a lot of what is happening in that two-year process.
Judge Amber Craft 13:45
Absolutely. I always ask a question of the day in drug court. So, what happens is at the beginning of the program, you’re going to come in front of me every single week, you come every week,
Margaret 13:54
Can I interrupt? So, the theater of court, am I assuming that all of the people who are required to be in that treatment court are sitting in your area, and then individually come up in front of each other?
Judge Amber Craft 14:13
Yeah, so they’ll come up. I’ll talk to them. We’ll talk about okay; you missed a drug test. Drug Testing is obviously a big foundation of the whole program, because we’ve got to know if people are using or not. And you know, you missed a drug test or you missed an appointment or, you know, you had a completely amazing week that you opened up with your therapist, because obviously, we don’t get into the nitty gritty of what they’re talking about in therapy, but their therapist will be like, hey, they’re doing great opening up, you know, I’ll praise people for those types of behaviors that we of course want to see them repeat.
So typically, what we do is we call up the people who have done well, first, and I’ll talk to them about, how are you staying on top of things. You know, you have all these things going on, how are you staying organized? So that kind of helps everybody else? Okay, well, they’re doing these things to stay organized.
So, in the beginning of the program, you’re going to come more frequently. And as you progress through the phases, you come less frequently, okay? But when somebody from we have four phases, the fourth is the final phase, when they come in, for example, this week, we a lot of people who we have graduation in two weeks, so all the people graduating came in, and I make sure I say, okay, you know, at the beginning of this program, you are a hot mess, and you really struggled. And here you are now getting ready to graduate, I want you to tell everybody, how you got here?
Or I’ll say, what advice do you have for the people who are in phase one, who might be really struggling right now? What advice do you have for them? And it’s like when I say the theater, of court, that’s what I mean.
But they also see if somebody comes up and, for example, I call it the poppy seed bagel, excuse somebody test positive for opiates. And they’re like, oh, it was that poppy seed bagel I ate, and everyone in my staff knows that I don’t buy that. And you know, and other people watch someone come up and try to like, BS me. And it typically doesn’t work. Well, you know, every now and then obviously, I’m not all knowing. But they watch what happens when someone BS’s me versus somebody that came out and said, listen, I tested positive for opiates. I used, you know, I need some help. And they’re gonna get two very different reactions for me, and everybody’s gonna see how I react. So that’s what I mean when I say the theater of the court.
Margaret 16:13
What about the families around the participants of treatment court? Are there services incorporated for them as well?
Judge Amber Craft 16:24
No, but that is a wonderful question. And it’s something that I’ve wanted to implement, although I’m not quite sure how to do it. I’m relatively new to treatment court. I’m presiding over drug court for two and a half years.
And then recently, at the beginning of this year, I took over a Veteran’s Treatment Court, which is different, but it’s also related, we have a lot of people with substance abuse issues and PTSD, you know, a lot of the things we see in drug wellness court.
So, I’m relatively new, getting my bearings. But one of the things that I see, you know, family support is huge. And so, I would love to offer some kind of program for that. But one of the things that’s interesting that I see, and I know, this is something that you know, a lot of people struggle with is I see enabling parents undermine their children. And I’ve seen it on multiple occasions. And if I see a parent like that I, I can almost guarantee that that person is not going to be successful.
And so, one of the things that I would like to do is have a class that would help a parent understand that concept.
Outro: I so appreciate how passionate Judge Amber is about her Drug Wellness Court. Sadly, as Amber shared the resources for families are limited and this just reinforces my passion to serve families through my business.
Learn more about my business at
embracefamilyrecovery.com
Come back next week to hear more of Judge Amber’s personal story around this family disease of addiction. Often there’s no coincidence why we end up serving people with the disease of addiction or their families.
I want to thank my guest for their courage and vulnerability in sharing parts of their story. Please find resources on my website
embracefamilyrecovery.com
This is Margaret Swift Thompson, until next time please take care of you!
