Due to the overwhelming caseloads processed through the court system, the needs of the offender for additional treatment (i.e., drug addiction, mental illness, alcohol abuse) find themselves incarcerated in an already overcrowded jail or prison with little or no treatment programs to address their issues.
One point of view to take is offenders do not have constitutional right to treatment. They committed the crime; they can do the time. On the other hand the view point of balancing prison and jail overcrowding, public policy, the right to fair and equal treatment, and assessing those who can be rehabilitated have the opportunity to additional resources. Every taxpayer should care about it. Taxpayer money is spent housing, clothing, feeding and medical care on offenders in jails and prisons that are not providing much in the way of being a productive citizen. In essence, by researching about problem-solving courts in whether they are effective and any policy implications, we might be able reduce the overcrowding issue in jail and prisons and more importantly provide those who otherwise be incarcerated be able to get the treatment they desperately need.
Taxpayers, correctional institutions, offenders, courts, victims, and policymakers will have an impact by moving towards a more rehabilitative system. However, by maintaining the status quo the American justice system might have a more negative impact if we do not find alternative solutions.
Problem solving courts rely on the application of rudimentary principles of operant conditioning to control behavior. They have been implemented as a response to the frustrations engendered by overwhelmed state courts that struggle to address the problems that are fueling their rising caseloads in an attempt to achieve better outcomes while at the same time protecting individual rights (Berman 2001). In this approach, the court works closely with prosecutors, public defenders, probation officers, social workers, and other justice system partners to develop a strategy that will pressure an offender into completing a treatment program and abstaining from repeating the behaviors that brought them to court (Minnesota Judicial Branch 2012).
