New Year’s Eve in Courtroom 202 of District of Columbia Superior Court meant staring at a sign warning, “ABSOLUTELY NO NEWSPAPER READING, SLEEPING OR TALKING WILL BE TOLERATED” and finding obedience to be limited.
One lawyer was scrutinizing that morning’s sports section, one court functionary had dozed off and several others were talking.
Non-compliance was sadly fitting. This is drug court for the nation’s capital, and few seem to care.
Like virtually everything else in the district, drug use is a mess. Crime has not declined as nationwide, which is to say drug use is rampant. An estimated 40 percent of felonies are linked to drugs.
The district and federal government are trying to do something and, for the last year, placed their faith in an experiment overseen by Superior Court Judge Jose Lopez, a good man in a tough task.
New Year’s Eve was his last day as the district’s drug judge. I wasn’t surprised to be the only journalist to take note of his farewell because nobody seemed to have noted his arrival exactly a year ago. The Washington Post did not mention him once during the last year.
It’s too bad since, on this day, everyone from a rumpled federal prosecutor to a teen drug offender knows it’s the swan song for Lopez, 48, a Dominican Republic immigrant who grew up in Brooklyn. Many who have had dealings with him are going to miss him.
“You have all the tools to stay drug-free,” Lopez tells the teen offender who has just finished a court-run treatment program. “Have a nice holiday and stay clean.”
At this point, something rather remarkable happens. The teen, whose hair is braided in long corn rows and is wearing brown work boots and a half-zippered blue parka, strides up to the bench to the man who resembles a well-muscled bantamweight boxer.
“My man!” he says to the judge, shaking his hand.
Several minutes later, Lopez is not nearly as pleased. Another defendant is trying to explain his tardiness. First, he cites an inability to break a $20 bill to get change for the subway. More relevant, as to why he missed a Dec. 9 court date, he cites surgery on his appendix.
He has no documentation of a hospital stay. “They didn’t give me no discharge papers,” he tells Lopez. “But if you don’t believe me, I can show up the scar right now.”
“Mr. Bell, on Jan. 8, you are going to be back for sentencing at 9 in the morning,” Lopez responds sharply. “And I mean 9 in the morning. I don’t want to look at your scar, and I have no obligation to call no hospital. You bring back evidence of being sick and hospitalized at that time. Call your lawyer to make sure he knows.”
About 10 minutes later, he has finished a modest case load, reminding lawyers and defendants that a new judge will be in charge as of Monday. He’s heading to the civil division.
At this point, the federal prosecutor who is assigned to the court this day and has apologized for leaving his necktie in his car, approaches Lopez as he prepares to exit.
“I think you did a great job, judge. You brought a special class and had a good rapport with the clients,” says Assistant U.S. Atty. Michael Tomaselli, 50, sporting a mustache and wearing a Harris tweed jacket, a blue button-down Oxford shirt and deck shoes.
Given the task and the public silence this experiment has inspired, such responses seem notable.
Washington has tried various judicial experiments to deal with drugs, many with federal dollars. In one try, which dates to 1994, three separate courts and approaches were used.
One court used the old-fashioned approach, namely without a treatment component. It served, to use the nomenclature of social science, as the “control group.”
The second used an even heavier dose of punishment. The third centered on drug treatment.
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But problems surfaced, including the decision of the City Council to get rid of tough mandatory minimum sentences for drug users, in part due to a sense that such sentences were unfairly punitive toward the district’s many young blacks.
With stiff mandatory sentences gone, prosecutors found that they lost bargaining power in goading defendants to plead. Defendants increasingly sought trials, rolling the dice that juries might be more sympathetic to defendants than in some other cities.
Figuring there had to be a better way and anxious about jails being clogged with drug abusers, the city and federal governments launched an experiment Jan. 1, 1997, that melded all three methods in one courtroom run by Lopez.
Those who take part are those charged with the felony of distribution of drugs or possession with the intent to distribute and who tested positive for drugs upon their arrests. They cannot have previous violent felony convictions or weapons charges.
Generally, they enter a plea of not guilty and enter a drug-abuse program. It includes twice weekly drug testing and two weekly (two-hour) group therapy sessions on substance abuse and relapsing. They are regularly tested for drugs, their attendance is monitored closely and they also can get counseling on finding a job and on related medical treatment, perhaps for AIDS.
This can last six months, during which time they would appear before Lopez roughly every 30 days. If they test positive during that period, they must show up in court the next day and spend two days in the courtroom.
There, Lopez would sit them in the jury box and have them watch the proceedings. He would talk to them at length. Perhaps there would be a 20-year-old offender and a 45-year-old one. He might turn to the younger and, pointing to the older, say, “You want to be like that in 25 years?” At times, it could be an effective smack in the face.
If they test positive again, they spend three days in jail. If they stay clean, there is the chance of pleading guilty and probation.
It is way too early to gauge results, and whether any empirical findings will come is problematic. The program does not follow those who are successfully released from the program to determine possible recidivism.
“Look, in an era in which nothing seems to work, this at least addresses a drug problem as more than just a crime,” said the tieless Tomaselli.
“Of course, some people will take a look at your 40-year-old junkie and say you’re wasting your money on him,” he said. “At the same time, you have to try something to cure this problem.”
He added, “Lopez made a connection with a lot of these people here. He brought a certain dignity and humanity. Other judges, even really smart ones, don’t. He sits there, rooting for them, but won’t make excuses.”
When Lopez exited the court, we sat in a small room and chatted. Only an hour earlier, I had been watching a rather highfalutin symposium on “Combating Drugs in Cities” on C-SPAN.
The session was from the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and, at times, verged on the pedantry that Lopez had scant time for. Should the law treat a bootlegged shipment of Valium the same way it does cocaine or marijuana?
“After a year of this, I better understand and appreciate what is meant by drugs controlling your mind,” Lopez said. “In effect, it’s another form of slavery. I saw lots of examples of people who relapsed and relapsed . . . .”
He has offered some counsel to his successor. “I told her you’re there to develop a relationship so they (offenders) know you truly care about their becoming drug-free.”
“I’m not the greatest speaker, but they were mesmerized at times,” he said. “The bottom line is that they get an opportunity to develop a relationship with an adult who’s respected, who genuinely wants to talk with them. They don’t get that in their world.”