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A study of Orange County police officers reveals frustration with the state’s policy of offering drug offenders treatment in lieu of incarceration. Published in the Criminal Justice Police Review, the study, “‘An Absolute Revolving Door’: An Evaluation of Police Perception and response to Prop 36” (pdf, subscripton required), also found that many officers circumvented Prop 36 in rejection of what they believed to be a very ineffective approach to drug policy. As Cook County embraces diversion and deferred prosecution, we must account for all justice system perspectives.

Prop 36 (aka Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act) is a California law passed in 2000 that allows nonviolent drug possession offenders to receive probation with treatment in lieu of incarceration.

Because it is the largest diversion-to-treatment policy in the United States, and one of the few drug treatment laws to be implemented state-wide, Prop 36 has been widely studied. The law has been praised for reducing reliance on jail and prison in the adjudication of drug cases–and thus, reducing costs.

But Prop 36 has also been criticized for failing to reduce drug use and recidivism–and perhaps even causing an increase in illegal drug activity. Defenders point to the fact that treatment programs have been underfunded. But they also acknowledge that diversion-to-treatment is not a panacea, particularly for defendants who are not motivated to rehabilitate.

While the academic and public response has been mixed, Orange County law enforcement officers are of like mind. Many police officers were deeply disturbed by what they characterized as a “revolving door” of drug defendants who became increasingly brazen in their public use and possession of drugs.

Exacerbating this frustration was also misunderstanding about the law itself. For instance, police routinely and mistakenly believed that Prop 36 prohibited police from searching probationers without probable cause–a probation condition commonly agreed to by defendants, including Prop 36 defendants.  Misunderstandings like this one needlessly frustrated police and their law enforcement efforts.

Some police officers used their discretion to circumvent Prop 36. For instance, some officers “stacked charges”–i.e., they combined a drug charge with a Prop36 ineligible charge such as false statement to an officer or traffic violations.

Overall, the impact of automatic diversion-to-treatment for drug offenders made police officers feel their efforts were invalid. One officer with an attitude the researchers found to be representative of the force summed up his experience this way:

“What’s frustrating is we’ve got a stack of [arrest reports] out there which represents thousands of man hours spent following these people, catching these people, doing the reports, going to court and everything else and they just prop them anyway. What’s the sense of me doing it? If tonight at 6:00 I’m working on an 11377 [possession of a dangerous drug] report that I know is not going to go anywhere, don’t you think I would rather be at my son’s open house? That stuff gets into play here.”

Notably, officer frustration was rooted in the perception that treatment did not work–a perception verified to be accurate in the case of many defendants. Officers overwhelmingly said they would support an approach that produces better treatment outcomes.

What does this mean for Cook County diversion? It means that any diversion strategy must account for all justice system players. It also means defendants must be assessed early and a continuum of care provided so that everyone sees results. Coordinated, thoughtful diversion planning is essential to create a credible program that reduces crime and incarceration without undermining existing law enforcement efforts.