Conference Agenda

Grand Ballroom, Floor 2

Brian L. Meyer, PhD, LCP
Clinical Psychologist, Central Virginia VA Health Care System

Shannon Carey, PhD
Co-President and Director of Development, NPC Research

Session Description

Why create a case plan that combines clinical and supervision requirements? How do you do it? Who needs to be involved? How do you use it once you have it? This session will review the use of assessments in developing clinical treatment, supervision, and other case planning, and combine them to create individualized plans for each participant. We will discuss how to involve the treatment court team and the participants in creating and implementing the plan. We will also address how to use combined case plans with participants and with the team to improve engagement, bring about behavior change, and increase success rates.

Learning Objectives:

• Understand what the elements of both clinical and supervision case plans are and how to combine them
• Understand the use of assessments in developing case plans
• Understand how to use combined case plans with the team and with participants to improve participant outcomes

Education Credits:

Approved for COB credit hours

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Great Hall 1, Floor 1

Dr. John R. Gallagher
Associate Professor, School of Social Work at Morgan State University

Session Description

The first qualitative study to give African American drug court participants a voice in the services they received was published in 2012. This presentation summarizes a decade long research agenda (2012 - 2022) related to African American participants’ experiences in drug court, with the goal of developing an in-depth understanding of the factors that may contribute to racial disparities in graduation rates. Overall, African Americans had favorable views toward key components of the drug court model, such as participating in random, frequent, and continuous drug testing and attending status hearings with the drug court judge. Conversely, most African Americans had unfavorable views toward their counselors and the quality of treatment they received for their substance use and mental health disorders. The findings from a decade of qualitative research with African Americans are discussed in reference to best practices in serving African Americans in drug court and other treatment courts.

Learning Objectives

• Synthesize the history of racial inequality in criminal justice and the role of drug courts in eliminating disparities in outcomes.
• Compare and contrast African Americans’ experiences in drug court from 2012 to 2022 to identify the factors that may contribute to racial disparities in graduation rates.
• Comprehend how a decade of qualitative research can be used to develop best practice standards in serving African Americans in drug court and other treatment courts.

Education Credits:

Approved for 4.0 COB credit hours

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Great Hall 2&3, Floor 1 

Shannon Carey, PhD
Co-President and Director of Development, NPC Research

Matt Collinson
Project Director, Justice Initiatives in the School of Public Affairs at American University

Karen Otis, NCC, LMHC, MA
Deputy Director, Treatment Court Programs, National Training and Technical Assistance, Center for Justice Innovation

Session Description

National technical assistance providers NPC Research, The Center for Justice Innovation and American University will discuss the benefits of knowing your data and using it to enhance program outcomes. The panel will highlight how to maintain fidelity to the treatment court model using the American University RED tool and NPC BeSt Assessment and get the best results in their specialized dockets.

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Performance Hall, Floor 1 

Helen Harberts
Attorney at Law, NDCI Consultant

Session Description

Supervision serves as the "eyes and ears" of the team, and supports the recovery process in many different ways. Supervision is about detection of behaviors and supporting the recovery environment This presentation moves quickly, has information for officers, and for teams on how to support folks in the community while they proceed through our Courts.

Learning Objectives

• Gain new tools to encourage motivation and engagement.
• Develop the "help ya" vs. "gotcha" attitude.
• Review officer and community safety protocols for professionals in the field.

Education Credits:

Approved for 4.0 COB credit hours

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US Bank Theatre, Floor 1

Judge Diane Bull, Retired
Harris County Criminal District Courts

Session Description

The relationship between the participant and the judge/team is the magic that makes treatment court work. How can we make our daily interactions with participants truly engaging? Are your court proceedings conducive to meaningful conversation? This interactive presentation will benefit all team members who interact with participants. It focuses on identifying and addressing factors that impede effective communication. The presenter will explore research-based reasons for improving communication and focus on practical strategies to identify and address common barriers such as trauma, motivation, and cultural differences. Attendees will learn specific techniques for effective delivery of responses to behavior to create learning opportunities for participants that motivate change and engagement and will receive useful handouts that will help encourage conversation and improve their communication skills with participants.

Learning Objectives

• Learn strategies for making the courtroom and court procedures trauma-competent and conductive to conversation and learning.
• Learn how to effectively deliver incentives, sanctions, and therapeutic adjustments to increase engagement and motivation.
• Learn how to forge a therapeutic alliance with participants and employ research based communication techniques to promote engagement and increase motivation.

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Senate Chamber, Floor 2 

Teresa Russell
Treatment Coordinator for the Jail Division, Montgomery County Sheriff's Office

Judge Kate Huffman, Second District Court of Appeals
Previously Montgomery County General Division Judge

Session Description

Peer support offers an opportunity for supportive, rather than directive assistance on the journey of recovery, encouraging self-direction, empowerment and choice. Peer supporters, credentialed by experience, share their “recovery story,” rather than an “illness story,” providing an opportunity to shift the identity of the client from an “addict” to a person fully engaged in life, with positive future opportunities in the initiation, stabilization and in sustaining recovery. While loved-ones, co-workers, counselors and court personnel may encourage change, greater efficacy for success in recovery lies in establishing relationships with individuals whose credibility rests in their shared life experiences. Peer support focuses on the social context of recovery, augmenting, rather than replacing or duplicating, other treatment components. The National Drug Court Institute has identified peer recovery support as an important opportunity in a drug court participant’s development of a recovery plan. Understanding that recovery represents a process, sequential intercept mapping identifies the vital opportunities to fill the critical service gaps and apply evidence-based practices including throughout the continuum of criminal justice services, from the time of arrest, pretrial detention, the trial process, and resulting from sentencing. Corrections settings represent an opportunity on the sequential intercept map to fill gaps in services and provide assistance designed to reduce future involvement with law enforcement and increase treatment entry and retention, assist in understanding and navigating specialized docket requirements, as well as support continued recovery.

This program begins with a review of the basic definition of, as well as criteria for securing certification as peer support in Ohio. The focus then turns to historical data collected (statistics involving criminal justice involved individuals with mental health and substance abuse issues) and how peer support, as an evidenced based practice, can provide additional intervention for individuals in any criminal justice setting. The program then lays out the framework for developing a peer support program in county jails and CBCF programs, (including, but not limited to, selecting appropriate peer supporters, the specific services provided by peer supporters and how the services are advertised to inmates and effectively delivered). The faculty will discuss how to integrate peer recovery services by building cooperative partnerships with corrections professionals and local treatment provider and focus on how peer supporters can effectively build good working relationships with court staff, and specifically those managing specialized dockets, while maintaining therapeutic rapport with their clients. Using the sequential intercept model, the presentation will further identify the means to take a program that is offered as a detention intervention and continue the support post-incarceration, including through specialized docket participation. Additionally, sources for funding peer support programs will be addressed.

Learning Objectives

• Define peer support and identify criteria for securing certification.
• Explain the core competencies of peer support.
• Describe the social framework of peer support and its benefits for clients in specialized dockets.
• Evaluate the importance and value of peer support in correction settings.
• Determine effective means of integrating peer recovery services into correction settings through building cooperative partnership, and determine funding sources for peer support programs in correction settings.

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Ohio Staters, Inc. Traditions Room, Floor 2

Tammy Doby
CEO, Urban Minority Alcoholism Drug Abuse Outreach Program (UMADAOP) of Franklin County

Timothy Richardson
Project Manager of Re-entry Services, Urban Minority Alcoholism Drug Abuse Outreach Program (UMADAOP) of Franklin County

Session Description

This workshop bridges the gaps for restored citizens as they reenter society after incarceration. The number of individuals who reoffend after being released from prison continues to increase. While there are many factors contributing to the continued increase in recidivism, the lack of understanding of restorative justice components and their absence from classes post-release is a major contributing factor. This workshop will introduce the four components of restorative justice to participants as a best practice to reduce recidivism.

Learning Objectives

• Learn the four components of restorative justice.
• Learn how to apply the four components of restorative justice in working with reentry clients.
• Understand the importance of incorporating the four components of restorative justice to reduce recidivism.

Interfaith Prayer and Reflection Room, Floor 3

Marie Lane, J.D.
Project Director, Justice for Vets Division of All Rise

Session Description

The roles of prosecutor and defense counsel provide the opportunity for a unique collaboration to effectuate positive change within the criminal justice system. While prosecutors and defense counsel may disagree on individual participants and legal matters, they aim to ensure that the treatment court produces the best possible outcomes. Effective collaboration between the prosecutor and defense counsel is vital for ensuring the treatment court program operates effectively, avoids pitfalls, identifies areas needing improvement, and provides equal participation opportunities.

Learning Objectives

• Describe common barriers and challenges each discipline faces when working with the treatment court population.
• Identify common strategies each discipline can utilize to overcome these barriers and challenges.
• Negotiate obstacles within the context of the prosecutor-defense counsel for the betterment of the team and participant outcomes.

Education Credits:

Approved for 2.5 CLE attorney professional conduct credit hours

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Grand Ballroom, Floor 2

Brian L. Meyer, PhD, LCP
Clinical Psychologist, Central Virginia VA Health Care System

Casey Clevenger
Treatment Court Commissioner, Boone County Courthouse

Session Description

The events of the last few years have caused the criminal justice system to look harder at itself and the inequities that have been found when examining how Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color are treated by the system. Treatment courts are no exception: inequities have been found in both admissions to and graduations from treatment courts. How can we change our courts to become more inclusive and equitable? This presentation will review what we know about racial inequities in treatment courts and then talk about how one court in Missouri changed the way they operate by changing their admission criteria, their court culture, and by developing a four-track program to better address the needs of individual participants. The result was a more equitable and inclusive court that increased both participation rates and graduation rates of people of color. This Missouri court, led by one of the presenters, received the 2021 NADCP Award for Equity and Inclusion in Treatment Courts. Come hear their story and learn how to change your court to become more equitable and inclusive.

Learning objectives:

• Participants will be able to identify at least three linkages between racist attitudes and the drug wars.
• Participants will be able to select and implement ways to make their court’s admission criteria more equitable
• Participants will be able to select and implement ways to significantly improve their court’s graduation rates of People of Color.

Participants will be provided with a list of recommended readings and media.

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Great Hall 1, Floor 1

Matt Collinson
Project Director, Justice Initiatives in the School of Public Affairs at American University

Dr. John R. Gallagher
Associate Professor, School of Social Work at Morgan State University

Session Description

A central tenet of specialized dockets is responding to the individual risk and needs of each participant. Every participant has a unique set of circumstances that led them to treatment court, and treatment plans, case management and supervision reflect that reality. One crucial and often overlooked aspect of the individual’s unique risk and need profile is the role their race, ethnicity, and cultural identity. Treatment courts across the country struggle to recruit, retain and graduate non-white participants, and American University’s work with Ohio over the past three years has shown similar trends, while recognizing the reality that most of Ohio’s 250 treatment courts serve counties that are predominantly white, and that questions of diversity and equity look different in this context. This session will examine both aggregated data and national trends, review statewide and local data gathered from AU’s partnership with the Ohio Supreme court, and discuss how courts in Ohio can incorporate best practices and promoting equity and equal access to justice, regardless of the demographics of their county or current court racial diversity. A court that is set up to respond to the nuances of racial and ethnic diversity will be best places to serve all clients and reduce disparities in outcomes.

Learning Objectives

• Understand best practices related to ensuring equal access and treatment for all court participants.
• Review recent trends in access to and graduation in Ohio treatment courts by race and ethnicity.
• Strategize policy and practices for courts to implement to ensure diverse participants succeed.

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Great Hall 2&3, Floor 1

Sean Clark, J.D.
National Director, Veterans Justice Programs in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Session Description

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs conducts outreach to justice-involved Veterans in thousands of criminal justice settings nationwide. This session will provide an overview of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ Veterans Justice Programs, including collaboration with local law enforcement deflection initiatives, and new grants for the provision of civil legal services to Veterans who are homeless or at-risk. It will also describe VA’s ongoing efforts to better understand the processes by which justice-involved Veterans are stigmatized, and address these to help create a more welcoming and inclusive environment of care. Finally, it will detail the crucial importance of early and accurate identification of Veterans in criminal justice populations, including through the use of records-based identification tools such as VA’s Veterans Reentry Search Service.

Learning Objectives

• Understand the full scope of VA’s Veterans Justice Programs.
• Learn about stigmatization of justice-involved Veterans, and recent efforts in response.
• Appreciate the importance of identifying Veterans in criminal justice populations, and free tools for this purpose.

Education Credits:

Approved for 4.0 COB credit hours

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Performance Hall, Floor 1

Brian L. Meyer, PhD, LCP
Clinical Psychologist, Central Virginia VA Health Care System

Helen Harberts
Attorney at Law, NDCI Consultant

Session Description

Psychostimulants, mostly methamphetamine, are now the #2 contributor to overdose deaths in the U.S. behind synthetic opioids. The use of meth has progressed from the West Coast to the East, and is becoming more common on the Eastern seaboard. Until now, it may not have been common in your treatment courts, but it is becoming increasingly common, particularly since it is increasingly packaged with other street drugs without the user knowing it is there. However, its previous infrequency in the East Coast may have resulted in some courts being unfamiliar with the differences in the presentation, management, and treatment of meth compared to other substances. This presentation will familiarize you with how to recognize signs of meth use, overdoses, and withdrawal. It will provide your court with specific strategies about how to manage the meth user’s behavior, the roles of different court team members, and the most effective treatments for meth addiction. It will help guide you and your court as meth use becomes more common among your treatment court participants.

Learning Objectives:

• Participants will be able to identify at least three signs of methamphetamine use and meth withdrawal.
• Participants will learn and be able to implement changes to the roles of treatment court team members that will reduce the use of meth in their participants.
• Participants will be able to identify and contract for the two major clinical treatments that have been shown to reduce meth use.

Participants will be provided with a resource list of readings to enhance their ability to implement the major treatments for Methamphetamine Use Disorder.

Education Credits:

Approved for 4.0 COB credit hours

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US Bank Theatre, Floor 1

Judge Diane Bull, Retired
Harris County Criminal District Courts

Session Description

Research show that incentives effectively reinforce new behaviors and build skills. The are positive, and validating, and often have long-lasting positive effects. They are one of our most effective, yet under utilized responses to participant behavior. Many programs have little of no budget for incentives and often miss opportunities to reward compliance. How can we increase our incentive-to-sanction ratio on a shoestring budget? In this fun, creative presentation, attendees will explore research-based reasons for rewarding participants’ target behaviors with incentives that promote engagement and will learn how to create a team dynamic that focuses on identifying and effectively rewarding compliant target behaviors. They will receive step-by-step instructions to create and immediately implement a variant of fun, budget friendly incentives that clients will enjoy and will learn specific techniques for effectively delivering these incentives.

Learning Objectives

• Learn how to identify participant proximal and distal behaviors that should be rewarded with incentives.
• Learn how to create and implement numerous low-cost/no-cost evidence-based incentives.
• Learn how to best use specific types of incentives to create learning opportunities.

Education Credits:

Approved for 4.0 COB credit hours

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Senate Chamber, Floor 2

Kim Kehl, M. Ed.
SAMSHA GAINS Center Certified Trauma-Informed Response Trainer

Judge Theresa Dellick
SAMSHA GAINS Center Certified Trauma-Informed Response trainer

Session Description

Trauma-informed care extends not just to the specialized docket participants but to the staffing team as well. Vicarious or secondary trauma is real and affects members of the team. Attention and care to vicarious trauma is important to keep the staff healthy and safe. Evidence-based guidelines outline the steps to identify secondary trauma, its impact, and self-care methods. Participants will also learn the epigenetics of trauma. This course is based upon SAMSHA-GAINS Institute research and practices.

Learning Objectives

At the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Define trauma and vicarious trauma.
• Discuss how trauma is often ongoing for many individuals involved in the justice system.
• Discuss how vicarious trauma can impact individual well-being and work performance for professionals.
• Describe the pervasive impact trauma can have on an individual’s life and how that affects their participation in the specialized docket process and how that affects the team.
• Discuss the difference between vicarious trauma, burnout, compassion fatigue and controlled empathy.
• Discuss the impact of intergenerational trauma and epigenetics
• Discuss the various self-care methods.

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NOTE: The presentation slides will be provided after the conference.

Ohio Staters, Inc. Traditions Room, Floor 2

Latonya Adjei-Tabi
Senior Program Associate, Center for Children and Family Futures

Session Description

A family-centered approach is key to effective treatment, sustained recovery, and family well-being. It includes a comprehensive array of clinical treatment and related support services that meet the needs of each family member, not only of the individual requesting care. This session will highlight the essential ingredients required to successfully implement a family-centered approach and cover practical strategies, challenges, and successes. In addition, it will review the state and local leadership efforts needed, including priority setting, evaluation, and funding, to ensure the implementation and sustainability of a family-centered approach.

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Interfaith Prayer and Reflection Room, Floor 3

Marie Lane, J.D.
Project Director, Justice for Vets Division of All Rise

Kendall Friend, MA
Project Director, National Drug Court Institute (NDCI)

Session Description

Working in these specialized courts does not mean that our professional ethics change. Indeed, we often have additional ethical mandates placed upon us because of out participation in these courts. The laws of confidentiality and the rules of ethics apply to EVERYONE on the team. These mandates can lead to team friction if there is no cross-training and understanding of how these laws and ethical mandates interact. It is crucial to understand the expansion of the limits on how information is shared, and for the entire team to maintain appropriate boundaries within their profession and team.

Learning Objectives

• Review the legal mandates of the federal rules of confidentiality and HIPAA as they apply in treatment courts.
• Review the role of specific ethical mandates and how they may interact with confidentiality laws.
• Review ethical breaches that have occurred in treatment courts and learn to identify when boundary problems and developing in the team.

Education Credits:

Approved for 2.5 CLE attorney professional conduct credit hours

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Grand Ballroom, Floor 2

Judge Diane Bull, Retired
Harris County Criminal District Courts

Shannon Carey, PhD
Co-President and Director of Development, NPC Research

Helen Harberts
Attorney at Law, NDCI Consultant

Session Description

Termination should be the same as surgery: it should be the ONLY thing you can do immediately due to the severity of the problem, or it should be the very last thing you should do after trying everything else.

Termination from a treatment court is a difficult decision. This class discusses how to approach (and possibly avoid) a termination. There is a checklist and publication which can guide teams through the "what have you tried" process before you make that decision. The decision also needs to be made by an objective cool headed team! Learn how, and use the checklist! The legal and technical standards will be discussed as well.

Learning Objectives

• Learn types of termination.
• Review emerging legal trends regarding terminations.
• Identify alternative ways to reduce negative terminations.
• Receive a checklist for termination decision making.

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