Program helping people with multiple criminal offenses having promising results
Sep 30, 2024, 8:55 PM | Updated: 9:09 pm
SALT LAKE CITY — It’s a problem the criminal justice system has dealt with for a long time — coming across defendants who are homeless, struggling with mental health issues or addiction.
Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said his office wanted to test how to minimize the number of interactions these defendants are having with the criminal justice system and how to provide them with the proper resources.
Familiar Faces Court
His office, along with the Salt Lake City Prosecutor’s Office, sponsored the Familiar Faces Court within the Salt Lake City Justice Court last year.
Defendants who have low-level misdemeanors and up to hundreds of run-ins with law enforcement qualify for the program.
“When they come to our court, the courtroom has been modified. There’s tables and chairs that are welcoming. It’s an environment to foster trust,” said Paige Williamson, of the Salt Lake City Prosecutor’s Office.
The defendants discuss their cases and are connected with social services. They meet once a week with Judge Clemens Landau of the Justice Court, a public defender, a prosecutor, a peer support group, and a case manager like Kim Russo.
“I sit down with each of them very privately and ask them what is going on in their life, and it opens up a door,” Russo said. “I don’t have food stamps. (And) I don’t have medical treatment because I don’t have my Medicaid. And then we go down further and they share with me the trauma from their childhood or the trauma they’ve encountered as adults, which led to their homelessness.”
Case plans
Specific case plans are made for each individual defendant. Along with meeting the judge, they must complete the individual’s tasks in order to graduate from the program and have their charges dropped.
“The struggles of my clients are complex, they’re multifaceted. And unfortunately, the traditional mechanisms of the criminal legal system are ill equipped to address these issues,” said Chris Manberg, of the Salt Lake Legal Defender Association.
“But I think rebuilding trust is one of the most important components of helping them achieve stability and self-sufficiency.”
On Monday, Gill said 67 people participated in the program, of which 26 participants graduated. Those who’ve completed the program have shown a decrease or even no run-ins with law enforcement. Gill said it also saves tax payer dollars to free up law enforcement to respond to other calls.
“Our traditional approach was not working, the threat of jail is sometimes we think the right incentive,” he said. “But for this population, for many of them, jail, it means nothing. But, if you treat people with a little bit of respect and dignity and you create a space where they can establish the trust (the) majority of the people want access to those services. It’s about changing that experience because we want them to get the help that they need.”
Gill said his hope is to extend this program long term.
“There are approaches that are here that are nontraditional without compromising public safety, where we can have better outcomes,” Gill said. “I’m guardedly optimistic that my policymakers in all three tiers of government are starting to recognize that. But we have to be able to demonstrate what that looks like. And that was the purpose of this pilot project.”
