New courts will address veterans’ unique situations

On Monday the Utah Judicial Council approved the first two veterans’ courts for Utah district courts. We will start one of them in the second week of January in my Provo courtroom.

The other will be in Salt Lake County. The Provo Justice Court is considering a similar program for Class B and C misdemeanants in the future.

We have used drug and mental health courts for years to break cycles of criminal behavior involving drug addiction and mental illness. The veterans’ court deals with those issues but focuses on felony and class A misdemeanor offenders who have been a member of our nation’s armed forces at any point in their lives.

Very few veterans commit crimes. But for those who have done so we now have a specialized means to help them lead happier, more productive lives.

We are staffing the court with legal and treatment professionals motivated to help participants proceed. Our Utah County Attorney and director of the county Public Defender’s Office are personally appearing in court to facilitate participants completing the process. I will preside as the judge to provide motivation and enforcement for veterans to succeed in treatment. We three are wartime veterans and have experience working in drug and mental health courts.

We also have support from the Veterans Administration case manager for our area to help participants stay on track with their treatment and receive appropriate therapy.

Our sheriff, the director of the County Substance Abuse Division, the court’s clerks, our Trial Court Executive, who has long experience with specialty courts, and Adult Probation and Parole have stepped up to provide resources so we can operate the court without additional funding. It was important to us in developing this resource that we not have to go to the county or Legislature to ask for additional appropriated funds. We succeeded.

Finally, we are doing something unique in the field. We asked Randy Edwards and the Veterans Service Organizations he coordinates in the county to look into providing mentors to help our veterans get jobs, access other resources and provide role models to talk to.

Randy has been able to draw on the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Disabled Veterans of America, and others to recruit some great people to appear in court and help fellow veterans. I believe this service is crucial to our success.

A true saying goes, “There is nothing like talking to another veteran.” Something I saw after the Vietnam War was a few Marines in my battalion having a hard time adjusting mentally to peacetime due to such symptoms as nightmares, unusual temper outbursts and “force protection” paranoia. Some turned to alcoholism as a form of self-medication to help them forget, or even get a night’s sleep.

(Now we see a predominance of self-medication with illegal drugs.) However, the problems lessened when they could talk about their experiences with fellow Marines who had also been in the combat zone. Combining that association with 12-step and other therapeutic programs really helped people come back to a happier, more functional state and kept them on the team.

We want to reduce stress and substance abuse, and consequently stop criminal behavior, by joining support from trained veteran mentors with therapeutic treatment and rigorous compliance structure.

How can you help? If you are a family member, friend, clergy member, employer, teacher or other acquaintance of veterans in trouble with the law, talk to their defense counsel about participation in our problem-solving court. Our goal is to help them get a happier life, free of crime.If they meet entrance requirements and help us help them win this battle, they can get charges dismissed and probation successfully terminated a great second chance.

Judge Sam McVey is a retired Marine and Fourth District Court Judge.