DRUG COURT: SIX JUDGES CAN'T AGREE ON NEED

Money to help fund a three-county drug court has been available for almost a year, but judges in Bollinger, Perry and Cape Girardeau counties have yet to touch it.

Associate Circuit Judge Peter Statler, who was selected drug court judge, does not know when he might start hearing cases.

The indecision stems from a disagreement between the six judges in the 32nd Judicial Circuit. They are evenly split in their opinions on the need to start a drug court.

In recent years drug courts have gained popularity in Missouri and other states as an alternative to handling minor drug arrests. The courts offer intense local treatment and frequent scrutiny by judges, which advocates say aren't available now.

Judges Bill Syler, John Grimm and Statler all have said that a drug court could provide a more productive alternative to jail time. But associate circuit judges Gary Kamp, Scot Thompsen and Michael Bullerdieck don't agree.

Those arrested on misdemeanor charges for possession of minor amounts of drugs are already subject to random urine checks, multiple appearances before a judge and time in treatment centers, Kamp said. All of these are elements of state drug courts, which attempt to increase the out-of-jail accountability of offenders.

"We already have a drug court, only without the title," Kamp said.

A request to fund a drug court was filed with the 32nd circuit's budget committee in 1998 by Kent Hall, head of the state public defender's office for the 32nd and 33rd judicial circuits.

Kamp, Thompsen and Bullerdieck had written a letter to Gov. Mel Carnahan last year requesting a line-item veto of the funding request from the judicial circuit's budget. In the letter, the three judges had cited a lack of planning and consensus among local judges and attorneys on how a drug court would be run.

Nevertheless, the money designated to pay salaries for a drug court commissioner and administrator was approved.

Since then the six judges have agreed to compromise and give the court a chance. But that doesn't mean all doubts have ceased.

Kamp believes drug courts aren't suited for justice in rural counties. Too few offenders would qualify to make it practical, and costs associated with maintaining offices in the three counties were not included in the appropriation, he said.

"The history of drug courts is that they work well in the big cities," Kamp said. "They catch the kind of cases that would normally slip through the cracks."

Once Kamp and others see their own drug court in action, Syler hopes their minds will change.

Most drug offenders who pass through the circuit's courts have been caught with small amounts.

"The serious dealers go to federal court," said Syler, presiding judge of the 32nd circuit. "We get the lesser lights."

Putting minor offenders in jail for long terms isn't possible or practical, he said. "It's cheaper to start more programs than build prison cells," Syler said.

The local, intensive nature of a drug court's operations makes it more attractive than either sending offenders to a treatment center out the area or locking them up. The best reason to do local rehabilitation, Syler said, is that the prisons are already full.

"All they do now is keep the baddest of the bad," he said.

Multiple contacts with a judge each week, which is not afforded in the present court system, is a benefit of the drug courts, Syler said. This won't change everyone, he said, but the intense contact does more to address underlying problems.

"Not everyone makes it through, but those who do are less likely to fall off," Syler said.

Statler, a juvenile court judge, sees drug court as a way to intervene early before youths begin going through the courts.

If drug habits are changed early, everyone saves money, Statler said.

"You can get someone paying taxes instead of costing tax money," he said. "The ripple effect is an incalculable savings to society."

Cape Girardeau County Prosecutor Morley Swingle still has reservations about a drug court but said he was willing to try it under certain conditions. He wants it to be used as a part of the sentencing process rather than allowing an offender to leave the criminal court with no pending charges.

At this point, Statler said he is trying to get the court set up to meet perhaps twice a week early in the morning in Jackson. But no time frame has been set for establishing it, he said.

Enough interest has been generated statewide in drug courts to make the inception of one here inevitable, said public defender Hall. "Somebody here just has to start the ball rolling and make it happen," he said.