Lessons from the Broward County Mental Health Court Evaluation

Annette C. Christy, Roger A. Boothroyd, Norman G. Poythress, John Petrila, Rhonda G. Ort

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The creation of specialty mental health courts has emerged as a strategy to address the impact of persons with mental illness in the criminal justice system by consolidating the management of certain types of cases into a single court. This article describes an evaluation of the nation's first such court, the Broward County Mental Health Court. The purpose is to alert those who may conduct future evaluations of these types of courts to some of the contextual, logistic, and management features of our evaluation and the challenges we have encountered doing field research in this unique legal setting.

Original languageAmerican English
JournalEvaluation and Program Planning
Volume25
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 1 2002

Keywords

  • Mental health courts
  • Specialty courts
  • Persons with mental illnesses
  • Study follow-up and retention
  • Program evaluation methods

Disciplines

  • Health Law and Policy
  • Law
  • Medicine and Health Sciences
  • Mental and Social Health
  • Psychiatric and Mental Health

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