HOODLUMS TO HEROES BY JOE ROBERTSON WORLD STAFF WRITER

Drug court program change lives

As far as anyone in the juvenile court knew, David could have been dead by
now.

You had to know the teen-ager when he was maddened by crank, clawing his
skin until he bled, trying to rid himself of the bugs he imagined there, his
teeth rotted, his body sallow and gaunt.

You had to know him then, Conley Tunnell said, to understand the swell of
smiles in the Tulsa courtroom when they saw him now.

Here he was, a hero in the Tulsa County Juvenile Bureau's new drug court
program, the first teen-ager to graduate to Phase Three.

The drug court, which began in January, still has growing pains. Concerns
about funding and whether the program is available ttttte to teens who need
it the most remain unresolved.

And there are no guarantees that other adjudicated delinquents in the
program will finally escape the crimes and deprivation led on by their
addictions to alcohol and drugs.

But if David can get this far, said Tunnell, the program coordinator, they
all have a chance.

The Tulsa World was allowed to watch several days of the new drug court,
under the agreement that identities of the families involved would be
concealed. All the names of the teen-agers in this story have been changed.

``I am so proud of you, David,'' said Catie Holzer, the program's intake
counselor, joining in the courtroom praise. `` When we first met, I didn't
know if you would live or die, let alone get sober.''

David looked straight at Judge Doris Fransein as she told him the counseling
team agreed he should graduate to the next level. His smile -- with teeth
newly repaired after years of decay and drug abuse -- pressed his round
cheeks against his wire-framed glasses. His skin was flushed and
warm-looking.

Another teen in the program who sat beside David at the table with other
teens extended his hand. David clasped it and they exchanged affirming
smiles.

Here was hope. Much of the time the hard trail of drug court is filled with
frustration.

Last time the court met, Eric, a teen in Phase One, said,``Yes, ma'am,'' to
the judge's insistence that he perform his community service.

``Yes, ma'am,'' he said, to her demands that he attend his aftercare. ``
Yes, ma'am.''

But the counselors know that these kids have been in the system long enough
to be wise to it, said Thad Brown, a family therapist with Family &
Children's Service.

``They know what to say to the probation officer and the judge,'' he said.
They make promises. They ooze repentance. They'll try to stay out of
juvenile detention or placement in a group home by lying.

But lies don't carry as far here -- not with the repeated contact from the
counseling team am and the weekly drug tests. They have to confront their
drug abuse more quickly than in the regular juvenile court process.

This time, when Eric spoke to Fransein, the counselors knew he disappeared
from home over the weekend and admitted to his probation officer he had
``used.'' He used drugs again. They knew he had done none of his community
service or attended any aftercare.

``I can't explain it,'' he said to the judge, offering only quick glances up
from the table.

``I just quit.'

Eric knew the consequences -- five days in sanctions, living in an intensely
structured camp near the Rader Center in Sand Springs. Fransein advised him
to contemplate his commitment to the program. Assistant District Attorney
Carl Funderburk waaaaa warned him that a petition to remove him from his
home was ready to go if he squandered this last chance.

``OK, Eric?'' Fransein said, leveling her eyes with his.

`` Yes, ma'am.''

When Eric gets out of sanctions, the team will go to work again, trying to
answer the question Tunnell asked in the staff meeting before court.

``How are we going to keep from losing him?''

A lot of people join the effort. In addition to the court personnel, the
probation officer, the intake counselor, a public defender, the prosecutor
and the Family & Children's Service therapist, the program also uses
counselors from Laureate Psychiatric Clinic and Palmer Drug Abuse Program.
It's too soon to tell if the program is successful. Tunnell thought
DavvvvvvDavid might be the first teen-ager lost from drug court. He even
started warning the team to be prepared for it, he said.

``I'm glad I was wrong about that one,'' Tunnell said.

David is making it after all.

"I think (drug court) is going to be nothing but successful, said Rick
Murray, the counselor from Palmer. My only regret is that we should have
been doing this for years.

The program has been evolving and more adjustments still need to be made,
Fransein said.

Originally, they planned to take on kids new to the juvenile bureau. But the
counseling team found it was hard getting family members of the first-time
offenders to participate.

Typically, parents weren't ready to say they also needed help, Fransein
said. She'd explain to parents that they, too, would be involved in
counseling, drug tests and weekly court appearances and they would become
defensive.

`` They'd think, `How dare you,' '' the judge said. `` They just want us to
fix their kids. It's our problem now.'

So the drug court team began working with kids deeper in the system, near
bottoming out.

There they found desperate parents ready to give drug court a try.

Even so, Fransein said, many parents need to be `` cajoled, enticed,
threatened -- whatever it takes. ''

She was ready to lay down some ultimatums with one teen-ager's separated
parents, telling them in court that she wanted to start seeing some
commitment in helping the boy, or they should ``butt out of Kyle's life.''

Kendall, an alcoholic teen who was struggling mightily to stay sober, needed
more structure in his home and the judge was frustrated by his mother who
was resisting attending Tough Love group counseling for parents.

``He's not old enough or strong enough to do this on his own,'' Fransein
said. ``If there is not enough structure, I will place him out of the
home.''

``I will go,'' Kendall's mother said.

At least Kendall and his mother are here. Fransein worries that some
teen-agers who needed the more intense treatment of drug court can't get it
because of problems in funding.

Right now, teens in impoverished families that qualify for Medicaid or
Medicare are funded.

They also can serve teens whose families have the resources or more
expansive health insurance that covers the prolonged counseling, drug tests
and therapy. But there are `` working poor'' families that fall in a gap,
Tunnell said. He figures that one out of every three or four teen-agers who
otherwise would be in the program are left out.

He's working on finding other funding sources to bring those kids in, he
said.

The counseling team also is looking at ways to bring more girls into the
program. As it is, the program is geared around family participation, but
many of the girls who get into drug crimes and prostitution as teens are
living a street existence with no family whatsoever, Fransein said.

Only one of the dozen teens currently in the program is a girl.

As the seven-month-old program moves along, the judge and the counselors see
new issues arising. Teen-agers in Phase Two who are getting the immediate
addiction problems under control are facing new problems.

Brandon talked about dealing with a breakup with his girlfriend.

Jason has trimmed his hair, taken to wearing sharper, more conventional
clothes, but disdainfully describes his new appearance as `` prep.''

He admitted to feelings of isolation in school, loneliness to have cut
himself loose from old friends who got him into trouble.

Fransein told the kids that drug court is still figuring out how it can help
them with these kind of problems. But she said she knows this much: ``It's
all part of becoming responsible,'' she said.

``You're (coping with) all those feelings you used drugs or alcohol to run
away from.

``It's OK to talk about it,'' the judge said. ``That's not being weak.
That's being strong.'

Checked-by: Rolf Ernst