Drug court helps addicts regain hope; grants to expand Collier therapy program

Susan Conklin recently sent her 13-year-old daughter in upstate New York a plane ticket to visit Naples.

It’s her journey, too. A comeback from a dark hole of addiction.

Conklin is rebuilding relationships after getting clean three years ago from heroin. When she faced prison, drug court gave her a chance. Somebody, somewhere, saw hope.

“For so long, I saw myself with no future,” Conklin, 32, said. “I didn’t see myself having grandkids. I didn’t see myself getting married again. I could see myself, looking at myself, dead in a dumpster with a needle in my arm. That is what I saw for myself. No hope. Whatsoever. None.”

Conklin regained custody of her youngest daughter, now 10, after completing drug court in October 2016. She has held the same job in a restaurant for three years. Weekends are spent fishing with family. She volunteers in the recovery community and is proud to be accountable to everyone in her life.

Drug court is chancy — and hard work — for addicts, Conklin said. The littlest setback can provoke their fragile state of mind. In a flash, the drug grip can take over and they throw the lifeline away.

“My kids were the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said. “I didn’t want to fail.”

In March, the David Lawrence Center in East Naples received a $360,000 federal grant to expand drug court by 90 people over three years, said Beverly Beli, director of adult community services at the mental health center. It’s the first federal grant since 2014, she said; and the county is adding $163,000 to it.

The mission is to help people who have been arrested for nonviolent drug offenses get off drugs and reintegrate — with probation — in the community. They still pay court charges, and treatment expenses can be on a sliding-scale basis.

Tracking outcomes is challenging because myriad entities are involved, including the State Attorney’s Office and the Department of Corrections. Last year, the county provided funding for a caseworker to run the numbers.

There’s no blueprint for determining when drug court is successful or not against relapses and re-arrests, which can occur months or years later, said Collier County Judge Janeice Martin, who presides over drug court on top of her regular caseload. Her father, Lawrence Martin, was the drug court judge in the 2000s.

The top question she gets is about success rates. Political sentiment remains mixed on whether drug court is worth the time and effort, she said. Currently, 65 people are enrolled.

Last week, Judge Janeice Martin received preliminary data that 60 percent of participants successfully completed the program from 2014 through 2016. Drug court is minimally one year of intensive group therapy, 12-step meetings, drug court appearances, random drug tests and curfews.

“I think 40 percent of people coming into drug court washing out is impermissibly high,” she said. “But that’s just the personal opinion of one individual on the team.”

The drug court team plans to attend the National Association of Drug Court Professionals meeting in Houston in late May.

More than half of 3,000 drug courts in the U.S. are for adult offenders, according to the Department of Justice.

Martin is curious how Collier’s graduation rate compares to other programs and whether national experts will advise drug court teams to be more patient with participants as a therapeutic court.

“I don’t want our team to pursue a graduation rate for the sake of having a graduation rate,” Martin said. “But I do want us to be thoughtful about whether we really think that accurately reflects the appropriate outcomes for the persons we tried to serve, and whether we are being too fast on the trigger.”

Collier County commissioners plan to host a June 5 workshop on mental health and substance abuse, similar to a workshop organized last year by Commission Chairman Andy Solis. Martin hopes to have more data to share.

The drug court process

Most people in drug court have prior criminal histories for drug-related offenses. Overwhelmingly, opioids and heroin addiction took over their lives, said Katie Burrows, clinical supervisor of forensic services with the David Lawrence Center.

Drug court referrals go through a chain of reviews in the legal system before being accepted. It may be 30 days from the date of arrest to referral and enrollment, she said.

They must read and understand terms of the drug court handbook and observe a session before they can be accepted. They sign a contract.

“They have to know the gist of what they are looking at,” Burrows said. Addicts are savvy and manipulative — a byproduct of the disease — and will tell the evaluation team what they want to hear to get accepted as a potential way out of prison time.

 “We hope there is a mindset they get to that they have a disease, that their life will get better,” Burrows said.

Drug court and group therapy sessions are held separately for women and men, an evolution of the program when the David Lawrence Center gained more resources to expand group therapy capacity, Martin said. It’s critical for people to be brutally honest and remove relationship dynamics.

“Everybody agreed, men and women, immediately agreed that they preferred it,” she said. “We just increased the feeling of safety for the women and for the men.”

Attending drug court every week is mandatory the first six months in the program and is reduced to bi-weekly and monthly during the last six months. A rigorous schedule of group and individual therapy is required; so is attendance at recovery meetings.

Martin updates her notes on everyone after each court session, apart from what clinical team has in each person’s file.

“It’s important to me to remember the things that are important to them,” Martin said.

Since taking the helm of drug court in 2011, she has wised up to when she is being “played for a sucker,” but she said she still agonizes over some decisions.

“It’s hard to keep them accountable without crushing their dreams,” she said.

Our previous drug court coverage:

2006:  Drug Court provides treatment and incentives

2007:  Drug court: Helping delinquent teens get clean and sober

2011:  Judge Greider has Drug Court participants running straight

2013:  Graduates of Collier's Drug Court go forth with charges dismissed — and 15 months of sobriety

2013:  Collier drug court loses grant but continues to run with creative thinking

2017:  Collier mental health program advocates talk strategy, need for aid

Drug court in action

Nineteen women chat in groups in the lobby of the Collier courthouse one Tuesday afternoon in early May. A bailiff announces which room for drug court. The women file in. Some appear anxious; others have been coming for months.

Martin calls each one to the podium and asks what’s going on with her program, her job or hunt for one, her state of mind. Martin has minutes with each to get a sense of what’s going on.

One woman finished inpatient addiction treatment the day before and was new to drug court. She was overwhelmed by the schedule.

“If you didn’t feel overwhelmed, I’d be a little nervous,” Martin said, suggesting the woman write down her schedule to help with anxiety.

Another woman was drug-tested before court. She failed.

“I need you to get real, to get honest,” Martin tells her before sending her to jail as a short-term sanction. “We can’t do this for you. We will do our part, you do your part.”

People are given second chances after they violate rules but face punishment. The possibilities are vast, including community service hours, a tougher curfew, jail time or placement back into an earlier program stage.

Martin said she tends to defer to the collective recommendation of the team. When someone fails drug court, it is a violation of probation and the person can be sentenced to prison, sent to inpatient rehabilitation or probation terms are changed. On rare occasions, Martin said, she will override the team’s stance on what to do with someone.

“This is a collaborative process,” she said. “It will fail instantly if any one of us starts to dominate it.”

During a recent drug court session for men, several men dwelled on their girlfriends. One man spoke about a relapse with a girlfriend. Martin nudged him to think selfishly instead of the relationship.

“Is it smart for you?” she asked. “Are you going to keep making it tough or make changes?”

She gives him a curfew and suggests he put the relationship on ice.

“Let’s figure out a way to avoid this from happening again,” Martin said, before adding that he must stop beating himself up for the relapse.

“Let that go as fast as you can,” she said.

Moving on

Conklin, who completed drug court in October 2016, remembers her initial fear of being called to the podium and having to speak.

“It was really intimidating because I was so insecure about myself,” she said.

She detoxed in jail after getting arrested in a hotel parking lot in March 2015. Earlier in the day, she overdosed in a hotel room. Her boyfriend flushed her drugs and she was mad. She fled the hotel room and bought drugs in the parking lot. Deputies swooped in.

Part of her order with drug court was to stay at St. Matthew’s House, the homeless shelter and structured drug recovery program in East Naples. That was a deal breaker to her, and authorities agreed to change her order to a sober house. She lived in three sober houses during her nearly 15 months in drug court. Some people need residential supervision.

Any little thing in group therapy could set her off. Conklin argued with therapists. About seven months in, she was getting it.

“I gave it my all. I shared everything,” she said. “I think all of the accountability helped me. I think the gifts I started to get back, by not getting high and always doing the next right thing was attractive to me.

"The whole thing about drug court is it teaches you how to be honest, accountable and responsible.”

Drug court saved her life, but a 12-step fellowship afterward has been critical for changing her life. About 15 months ago, an after-care segment was added to drug court because people were completing the structured program but couldn’t manage the new freedoms and were relapsing, said Burrows, of the David Lawrence Center.

“If you want get better, do drug court,” Conklin said. “Put everything into it because what you put into it is what you will get out of it. Drug court really does work if you work the program.”

Martin has connections with employers to help with jobs. A couple dozen businesses realize being flexible with schedules so people can attend drug court and therapy is worth it. Drug court graduates are grateful for jobs and might be more reliable, Martin said.

“I love the fact that there is a growing list of employers in town who have given our folks an opportunity,” she said.