Therapeutic jurisprudence revisited: The experience of criminal justice and treatment in Torontou27s drug treatment court

摘要

This thesis enlists therapeutic jurisprudence theory to evaluate programming at the Toronto Drug Treatment Court (TDTC). Through interviews with 17 TDTC professionals and observations of court proceedings, the study examines the roles and responsibilities of staff members, the relationship between the legal system and drug treatment initiatives, and the relevance of therapeutic jurisprudence to the operations of court personnel. The research shows support for the therapeutic jurisprudence perspective. According to the TDTC professionals interviewed, despite difficulties in reconciling the imperatives of treatment and control, both workers and participants benefited from the programu27s criminal justice-drug treatment partnership, and from the therapeutic aspects of the court process. A therapeutic jurisprudence analysis of drug treatment courts like the TDTC must take into account the justice-treatment relationship, the implications of this relationship for assessing the u27well-beingu27 of u27drug-addictedu27 offenders, and the challenges of merging these two paradigms to address addictionmotivated crime.