With OAS Support, Trinidad and Tobago to Launch the Country’s First Drug Treatment Court in 2012

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad – Trinidad and Tobago will launch the country’s first Drug Treatment Court in 2012, to include technical assistance, training and cooperation from the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission (CICAD) of the Organization of American States (OAS).

The Minister of National Security of Trinidad and Tobago, John Sandy, said his country “needs to find different and innovative alternatives to improve citizen security.” In response to that need, the Drug Treatment Courts have emerged as a multi-disciplinary practice policy marrying prevention policies, treatment and justice, and have shown results in other countries of the hemisphere to reduce crime and with it, the recidivism rate, the prison population and drug dependency.

This strategy includes the establishment of drug treatment courts where an individual’s recovery is closely supervised by a judge with the power to reward progress and rebuke relapses. To this end, the judge uses a team of prosecutors, defense lawyers, health professionals, social workers and police to rehabilitate and reintegrate individuals back into the community.

The OAS is working with a number of organizations to identify innovations and good practices in addressing the needs of drug-dependent offenders, both through drug treatment courts and other holistic approaches that treat the individual, his or her family, work, health and social wellbeing as a whole, while still ensuring that the community’s security concerns are met.

Other countries of the region to initiate pilot projects or similar developments with support from the OAS include: Bahamas, Jamaica, Argentina, Dominican Republic and Costa Rica.

The announcement was made by the Chief Justice of Trinidad and Tobago, Ivor Archie, during the opening ceremony of the training workshop “Implementation of Drug Treatment Courts as an Alternative to Incarceration for Drug Dependent Offenders,” held October 18 to 21 in Port of Spain. The workshop was attended by more than 70 judges, prosecutors, treatment providers, defense attorneys, probation and police officers from Trinidad and Tobago and The Bahamas, who learned about the experiences of countries that have already implemented treatment drug courts as an initiative to promote a comprehensive approach to treatment and the drug problem in the region.