ADDICTS OFFERED NEW OPTION BY GLASGOW COURT

SCOTLAND'S first American-style drugs court, which aims to break addicts'
cycle of crime, opens in Glasgow today.

The court will offer nonviolent offenders the option of being sentenced to
treatment orders, a tough system of assessment and rehabilitation designed
to help them to stop offending.

Offenders have been given a warning that the specialist court will not be a
soft option. It will have the power to impose some of Europe's toughest
sanctions on addicts.

Only people whose addiction can be linked to their offending, typically
stealing up to UKP 400 a week to fund their habit, will be eligible. It is
expected that the court will handle 150 to 200 cases a year.

Moira Price, a former Glasgow fiscal who will help to co-ordinate the
court, said it would build up a closer relationship with the offender. "The
sheriff will have the full range of powers, including imposing drug testing
orders, which they can already do, but they will also have powers to make
enhanced probation orders," she said.

"Offenders will then have to come back to the court to explain what they
have been doing since their last appearance and hopefully to explain their
reduction in drug taking.

"This is not a soft option. It is one of the most intensive community-based
disposal systems you can get."

After their arrest, drug offenders dealt with by the court will make
contact up to twice a week with workers over a four-week assessment and
testing period, before being given a treatment order by a sheriff of six
months to three years.

During the period of the order, offenders will regularly have to "check in"
for assessments by health and social workers to chart how far they have
gone in tackling their addiction. Only offenders who plead guilty at the
normal custody court hearing, usually a day after their arrest, will be
assessed for inclusion on the drug court programme.

The Scottish Executive accepted the idea of drugs courts last year after a
United Nations report said that they were a key step forward in reducing
drug-related crime. The report claimed that dealing with substance abusers
in special courts reduced reoffending and saved money in the long term.
Since they were introduced in New York in the late 1980s drug crime has
halved in the city.

There are now 250 drugs courts across the United States which have the
power to order treatment and rehabilitation services instead of prison,
although custody can be used as a punishment for offenders who drop out of
the programme.

Police and politicians support the system, already being tested in Croydon,
Liverpool and Gloucestershire, because it takes drugs offenders out of the
mainstream system and allows courts more time to deal with other cases.

Judge Paul Bentley, who presides over the first drugs court in Canada, set
up two years ago, said: "We are very encouraged. Our first-year assessment
showed three quarters of those in the programme have not committed another
crime, are drug-free and have found a stable home and job."

Scotland's drugs court will be housed in the Glasgow Sheriff Court
building. Iain Gray, Deputy Justice Minister, said: "Drug courts offer
offenders a way out of the cycle of crime if they are ready to take part in
a rigorous programme of testing and treatment.

"They also offer a better way for communities and businesses that are now
badly affected from drug-related crime. The current system has especially
failed them. We must be smarter, so that we can rebuild and strengthen
communities blighted by drugs."