A new Wellness Court in Kansas City, Missouri, is aiming to take a more comprehensive approach to cases involving substance use and mental illness.
The new specialty court is designed to merge the city’s separate mental health and drug courts, considering offenses alongside resources, treatment and a pathway out of the legal system.
Kansas City has had various specialty courts for more than 20 years. The new wellness court is the city’s latest attempt to reduce recidivism as well as better support people going through the legal system.
Kansas City Presiding Judge Courtney Wachal, who was appointed to the city’s domestic violence court a decade ago,oversees the new wellness court.
While there are thousands of drug courts nationwide, there are fewer than 500 courts dedicated to mental health. Watchal said when the system is set up to filter individuals with “co-occuring” issues or offenses between two different courts, some people might fall through the cracks.
“Every individual is different and if we didn’t get it right, then we kind of lost that individual in the process,” she said. “We spent too much time trying to figure out where they belong, and by the time we figured it out, it was like we’ve already kind of lost them in the system.”
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About two in five people who are incarcerated in the U.S. have a history of mental illness, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Oftentimes, this means the country’s jails and prisons end up serving as mental health facilities, which have limited treatment resources, Wachal added.
Someone with a serious mental health condition is booked into a jail about two million times each year, according to NAMI.
This is likely an undercount, said Shannon Scully, senior manager of criminal justice policy at the mental health organization, “because we don’t always get a lot of really good data about people who are booked into jails.”
On the opposite side of the state, St. Louis County has a similar co-occurring court that offers an alternative to incarceration.
Wachal said most people who go through the city’s specialty courts “do not often see the legal system as something that’s trying to help them.”
“Most of them have been incarcerated. It has been a terrible experience,” she said. “They don’t trust the legal system and they don’t trust the judges.”
This is where specialty courts can build some trust by pulling in mental health advocates, substance misuse support, the judge, probation officers in one room to support the person in their process, the judge added.
“What we see happening is it’s really more about an intense collaborative process to kind of wrap around these individuals and really support them on getting on a path to recovery,” Scully of NAMI said.
Kansas City’s Wellness Court is an option for people charged in its municipal court, which handles various city ordinance violations. The program is a court-supervised treatment program made available to those who show signs of co-occurring disorders. Acceptance into the program is voluntary and the court assesses each person’s needs for treatment upon entry.
A team involving a lawyer, probation officer and coordinators help each participant stay on track with their treatment plan and monitor their progress. Each person is expected to make all their appointments, court appearances, and attend weekly self-help classes or groups, among other expectations.
The third phase of the four-part program is where people get more freedom to participate in social programs and activities, Wachal said. At this community reintegration stage, participants work to repair their relationships with their families, start applying for jobs, and keep up the momentum they have already established. The last step is all about maintenance; participants gear up for graduation, maintain a job and housing.
“Let’s really give them a chance so that when they’re out on their own, they have something to live for,” she said. “They’re prepared to stay out of the legal system and live a full life.”
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To graduate from the program, participants will have to meet certain requirements, including completing treatments for substance use or mental health treatment, being alcohol and drug-free for at least 180 days and complying with a relapse prevention or aftercare plan, among others.
Holly Miles is the executive director of NAMI Kansas City, a role she started in September. Before then, she worked for 20 years as a psychiatric mental health nurse.
There is a breakdown in mental health resources across the board, she said.
It may be hours before someone going into an emergency room who is experiencing some sort of acute psychosis gets the medication they would need, she said.
“I feel like it’s just part of being a decent human being and trying to get people to help that they need,” Miles added “They deserve a shot at life, some type of a quality of life.”
The Kansas City municipal court will also launch a new women’s court in March, in time for Women’s History Month, as another offshoot under the wellness umbrella. For this specialty court, sexual assault and human trafficking, among other traumas, will be the focus. Human trafficking remains a big issue in Kansas City and the rest of the state, said Wachal, who serves on the Missouri Supreme Court’s task force to combat domestic violence and human trafficking. Human trafficking survivors are often in the legal system as defendants, which further victimizes them, she added.
“This [women’s] court is designed to lift them up and again, give them the tools that they need to break that cycle and live a silk life,” Wachal said.
A Homeland Security operation in Kansas City in 2021 led to a rescue of 31 survivors who faced sexual exploitation. Of those, 14 were missing children.
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“When you change the way you approach people and you give people the opportunity to be heard and seen and give them the support and show them that you believe in them and then give them some tools for that, they can thrive,” Wachal said.
The municipal court is developing a nonprofit board of directors that would work to collect donations so that participants could get financial assistance for dental work and first month’s rent, among other needs, to help rebuild their lives.
“In municipal court, people are not in there for felonies. Now, we have some very serious cases, and that’s a whole other discussion. But for better or for worse. The maximum range of punishment here is six months in jail, and we can do a lot better than that,” Wachal said.
