NIC Publication Release webinar: "Veterans Treatment Courts: A Second Chance for Vets Who Have Lost Their Way"
Date: May 17, 2016
Time: Please note webinar start time/your time zone
10:00-11:30am PT / 11:00-12:30pm MT/AZ/ 12:00pm-1:30pm CT / 1:00pm-2:30pm ET
Target Audience: Criminal Justice Professionals, Veterans Service Organizations / Community-Based Providers / Those interested in Justice Involved Veterans Issues
Register Here https://nic.webex.com/nic/onstage/g.php?MTID=e03799ea7bb2d8e58f8370d36619bdd5d
Description
Sentencing alternatives for veterans? There are dozens of specialized courts across the country that employ therapeutic programs to help keep veterans out of jail. "Veterans Treatment Courts: A Second Chance for Vets Who Have Lost Their Way" is a new publication that tells the story of these veterans and the judges, veterans advocates, and treatment professionals who are fighting to ensure a second chance for vets who find themselves caught up in the criminal justice system.
The publication was produced in partnership by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC), a division of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and the Veterans Health Council of Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA). The report is based on a series of interviews and personal observations of the judges, veterans, and veterans advocates who have been intimately involved in the founding and operation of veterans treatment courts. In this book, they relay how veterans treatment courts are "the right thing to do" for justice-involved veterans who commit certain crimes associated with the lingering legacy of their wartime experiences.
Court staff and graduates of veterans treatment court programs describe, in often exquisite detail, what their roles are and how they have come to embrace the concept that these courts, which use a carrot-and-stick approach to rehabilitate rather than overtly punish veteran defendants, represent what one veteran in Buffalo, New York, a key player in the creation of the first of these courts in the nation, has called "the most profound change in the attitude of our criminal justice system towards veterans in the history of this country."
Objectives
This publication was authored by Bernard Edelman, Deputy Director for Policy and Government Affairs, VVA; and consultant Dr. Tom Berger, Executive Director of VVA's Veterans Health Council.
Panelists
Bernard Edelman, Author, Vietnam Veterans of America
Thomas J. Berger, Ph.D., Consultant, Vietnam Veterans of America
Honorable Robert Russell, Jr., Erie County Court Judge, Buffalo, New York
Melissa Fitzgerald, Justice For Vets
Patrick Welch, Ph.D., Buffalo Veterans Treatment Court
Nicholas Stefanovic, Rochester Veterans Treatment Court
Moderator
Greg Crawford, NIC Correctional Program Specialist
Producer
Leslie LeMaster, NIC Correctional Program Specialist
For additional resources on justice-involved veterans see NIC's Veterans webpage
This blog is funded by a contract from the National Institute of Corrections, U.S. Department of Justice. Points of view or opinions stated in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.