Veterans courts: How Illinois can help its incarcerated veterans

Veterans courts provide Illinois a more effective way to address offenders who have served in the military, allowing the state to rely less on incarceration

Veterans, as a group, are overrepresented in the criminal-justice system. Surveys by the Bureau of Justice Statistics show that approximately 10 percent of inmates in state prison report prior military service. As of 2007, over 700,000 veterans nationally were in prison or jail or under another form of correctional supervision, according to the Pretrial Justice Institute.

This means that if Illinois incarcerates veterans at the same rate as the rest of the country, nearly 5,000 Illinois prison inmates have served in the armed forces.

The nation asks a lot from its service members, but too often ignores their struggles when they return home. Veterans are more likely than civilians to experience homelessness. And many returning veterans face mental health struggles: An estimated 30 percent of Vietnam War veterans suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, compared to about 7 to 8 percent of the general population, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. These factors contribute to veterans’ disproportionate involvement with the criminal-justice system.

Illinois can help veterans with problems such as homelessness and mental illness obtain necessary services and can reduce the need for incarceration by further embracing “veterans courts.”

Veterans courts focus directly on the needs of former and current members of the armed forces.

Here’s how they work: Participation is generally limited to veterans with nonviolent records who have been identified as struggling with substance abuse or mental health problems. (Some jurisdictions allow offenders with violent records to participate on a case-by-case basis, as alcohol or other drugs are involved in 78 percent of violent crime in the United States.) If a veteran offender is arrested for an offense but agrees to participate in mental health or substance-abuse treatment, avoid committing new crimes, and meet certain other requirements, the charges against him or her are dropped.

In Illinois, the Veterans and Servicemembers Court Treatment Act allows veterans courts throughout the state to establish such courts at the local level. Today, there are 18 veterans courts in Illinois spread across 12 counties, with several in Cook County, according to the Illinois Association of Problem-Solving Courts.

The courts are relatively new, but evidence shows this approach is working. The country’s first program, which started in Buffalo, New York, in 2008, boasted a 90 percent program-completion rate and no recidivism as of 2010. One Cook County veterans court reported in 2011 that 86 percent of participants had no new arrests, and 95 percent had no new convictions. With careful controls and implementation, local governments are seeing similar success elsewhere.

There is, however, room for improvement. Not all of the exclusion criteria for participation in veterans courts make sense. Some counties, for example, exclude those charged with DUI and DWI from participating, thereby keeping out the very veterans who are likely to have substance-abuse problems that might best be addressed through veterans courts.

Problem-solving courts, such as veterans courts, demonstrate that one-size-fits-all regimes don’t work for everyone. By targeting criminal-justice resources in innovative and strategic ways, Illinois can do more to help veterans, keep people out of prison, and more effectively protect public safety.