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I'd like to share a story of my veteran son who had to unfortunately deal with the legal system after he came back from his second deployment.
When he first went into the Army National Guard in Columbus, Ohio, he came home.
I had him enrolling in Ohio University, going to academia, you know, getting his life right straight out of high school.
And he came home and said, Mom, like you do, I'm being inducted tomorrow and I'd really like for you to be there.
And I thought, inducted? He hasn't even been in school yet. I said, what's going on?
He said, well, I joined the Army National Guard out of Columbus and I'm being inducted tomorrow.
And I said, okay, have you really thought about this?
And he said, yes, I really want to go, you know, and help keep you safe here at home.
He came back in 2012 from that second deployment.
And that's when we started to have some difficulties with alcohol and DUIs.
...
But he wasn't a criminal per se, not in our eyes.
I just saw a case where we need some help here.
When I first again started doing all this, I contacted our local veterans office and asked them if there was any type of help that I could get.
And it was a big struggle. It was frustrating.
It was heart-wrenching, anger.
I could not understand why people were not educated in our area about a veterans treatment court.
All my research that I found, I was really getting where I had to work so hard.
I was just pulling and pulling and trying to give all the information I could to his attorney, to my son's attorney.
So again, I just did everything I could, started reaching out to people to try to help save Josh, help saving.
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Well, the veterans treatment court is a combination of the model of mental health court as well as drug court.
So you're treating both components there.
What we've added are the mentoring program, the peer mentoring program of other veterans talking the language to a veteran to hopefully make that connection.
I'm not a veteran, so I think that's really helpful.
I think there's also an understanding that another veteran has with a fellow veteran.
There's a bond and a uniqueness, and I think that that's an interesting difference between the other treatment courts.
And then I also believe another difference is some of the wellness activities that are being encouraged to substitute for some of their bad habits and unhealthy habits.
And we work in that regard.
The veterans court treatment team is an integral part of the docket and how the cases are handled.
And we have law enforcement involved, peer mentors that are veterans involved, probation officer, prosecutors, defense attorneys, clinicians,
veteran benefit providers, veterans service center.
I'm sure I'm forgetting a few, but oh, employment pieces and housing even for veterans.
They're all there every day or every week that we have court.
We are problem solving.
We are discussing how to what may be in the best interest of the specific veteran to get compliance with the treatment plan.
What sanctions or rewards may be appropriate in order to increase motivation or ensure that there's compliance.
But the interesting part of it is that it's a team and it truly operates as a team.
Everybody has input and it is absolutely amazing to make a difference in someone's life to put them on the right path and not let them be forgotten.
Thank you.
