海角大神

Earlier this year, Marshall Little walked into a Wal-Mart in Hartford, Conn., and tried to walk out with a GPS navigator without paying. A few months later, he walked into a supermarket and tried to leave with $226.26 worth of food.

鈥淢arshall, how many times have you been arrested?鈥� Judge Raymond Norko asked when Mr. Little appeared before him at Hartford Community Court.

鈥淔our times?鈥� Little said. 鈥淔our times, I think. Enough.鈥�

鈥淓veryone says 鈥榚nough,鈥� 鈥� Judge Norko replied.

鈥淚鈥檓 not coming back,鈥� Little said.

Norko sentenced him to 60 days in jail and sent him on his way.

That鈥檚 one of the stricter sentences that Norko has dealt while presiding over the Hartford Community Court. More often, his sentences resemble courses of treatment arranged by social workers 鈥� counseling for some, community service for others. And the judge鈥檚 involvement doesn鈥檛 stop there.

Later that afternoon, a woman struggling with substance abuse approached the bench. It was not her first time in front of the judge.

鈥淚 did everything you said, Your Honor,鈥� she told the judge.

After consulting with the prosecutor, Norko set a time for her to return six weeks later.

鈥淲hen you come in,鈥� he said, 鈥渘o excuses.... If you come in positive [for drugs] I鈥檓 going to jail you.鈥�

That kind of personal follow-up may seem unusual for the court system. But the Hartford Community Court is part of a different breed of specialty courts that are popping up across the country. These operations have small staffs and deal only with specific crimes in specific neighborhoods. Some focus on drug offenses; others handle cases involving veterans.

Community courts, like Norko鈥檚, deal with so-called quality-of-life offenses in high-crime, urban neighborhoods. These relatively minor, always nonviolent, crimes range from loitering and panhandling to shoplifting and trespassing.

In a traditional criminal court, those cases are often dismissed or expedited as judges and lawyers devote more time to violent offenses. And offenders frequently return to the streets, where many offend again.

In Hartford, this revolving-door system prompted local community groups to campaign for a community court to address persistent minor offenses. Hyacinth Yennie, head of the Maple Avenue Revitalization Group in Hartford, says it was common in the 1990s to see people drinking and urinating in the street.

鈥淚t was almost lawless,鈥� she says.

鈥淭he prosecutor [would] just throw them back out because they thought 鈥榯hese are just nuisance complaints,鈥� 鈥� Ms. Yennie says.鈥淭hese aren鈥檛 just nuisance complaints. They鈥檙e quality-of-life issues that affect us every day.鈥�

Community courts allow for the best of both worlds, according to Chris Pleasanton, the program coordinator at the Hartford Community Court. With community courts handling all quality-of-life crimes, criminal courts are able to focus their attention on more serious and violent crimes. In turn, the community courts can work with defendants to address the root causes of their offenses, which often stem from mental illness and substance abuse.

鈥淲e have to kind of decode the person and figure out how to best help them,鈥� Mr. Pleasanton says. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 want to see people continually spiral because they鈥檙e not connecting with the services they need.鈥�

The community court system is designed to get a defendant into and out of court as soon as possible, minimizing costs in the short run and, ideally, the long run as well. Police officers can issue court summonses for quality-of-life crimes on the spot, and the defendant has to show up at the court within two days. Most defendants receive a day of community service, according to Norko, but punishment can range from multiple days of community service to jail time, especially if the individual has past offenses.

Most of the cases are eventually dismissed after the defendant has fulfilled his or her obligations. Any violent crimes go straight to the city鈥檚 criminal court, a feature Norko says is important in making the public feel secure that violent criminals aren鈥檛 being given softer sentences.

Community courts started to appear in the early to mid-1990s, according to Greg Berman, director of the Center for Court Innovation in New York. Mr. Berman was part of the team that set up America鈥檚 first community court in Midtown Manhattan.

Community courts fell out of favor in the late 鈥�90s, Berman says, as 鈥渢ough on crime鈥� measures became popular. But with US prisons now more crowded than ever and weighing heavily on state budgets, community courts seem to be back in vogue. Today there are at least 40 community courts in 14 states and Washington, D.C.

鈥淲hen we started doing these things, we were really swimming against the tide. Everything in the 鈥�90s was really about getting tough on crime,鈥� Berman says. But now, 鈥淚 think the community justice idea is going to have another moment in the sun.鈥�

Success can be hard to measure in community courts. The most common criticism leveled against the community court system is that it is often unable to prevent relapses into criminal behavior, known as recidivism.

Criminal-justice researchers are trying to put together solid statistical evidence of how community courts are performing. Some of the early returns are encouraging. A 2014 study from the RAND Corp. looked at the community court in San Francisco鈥檚 Tenderloin district. It analyzed the nearly 10,000 cases involving 6,000 defendants that the court heard from March 2009, when the court opened, through December 2013. After examining recidivism rates for defendants, the researchers concluded that those tried in the Tenderloin Community Justice Center were 8.9 to 10.3 percent less likely to be rearrested within a year.

鈥淚f you want to spread [these] ideas, you have to go county to county and convince people. You have to convince hard-bitten, skeptical cops and prosecutors, so you have to have data behind you,鈥� Berman says.

The United States has one of the highest incarceration rates in the civilized world, according to the US Department of Justice, and municipalities are under enormous pressure to reduce their incarceration rates. Californians voted in November to reclassify some lower-level crimes as misdemeanors instead of felonies, a response to calls from the US Supreme Court for the state to address its overcrowded prisons. Commentators have called the measure the 鈥渆nd of California鈥檚 tough-on-crime era.鈥�

Denise O鈥橠onnell, director of the Justice Department鈥檚 Bureau of Justice Assistance, says community courts are an 鈥渋mportant element鈥� in reducing recidivism. 鈥淲e know far too many people are involved in our criminal-justice system,鈥� Ms. O鈥橠onnell says. 鈥淪o it鈥檚 really critical we focus on what we can do to reduce unnecessary incarceration and improve recidivism rates in the country, and community courts just have a really good track record of doing that.鈥�

But even if community courts do work, do they justify the cost it takes to keep them running? The Hartford Community Court costs roughly $2.6 million a year to operate.

And for some defendants, an intense focus on rehabilitation can be counterproductive, says Christine Cole, former executive director of the Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management at Harvard University鈥檚 John F. Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass.

鈥淏ut if they鈥檙e very expensive and creating very good outcomes for the people most likely to recidivate, then that鈥檚 a good investment, isn鈥檛 it?鈥� Ms. Cole says.

On a broader level, she says the lack of social services for individuals who need them most means some of them resort to the court system to find those services. In the past, courts seem to have reacted to this demand in the only way they knew how: They convict and imprison people, she says.

Some people have become frustrated with the inability of criminal courts to address the underlying social issues that drive low-level crime, even though it鈥檚 not the fundamental purpose of these courts, Cole says. Community courts appear to be a popular response.

In many cases, a defendant can arrive for a court date in the morning, see the judge in the afternoon, and meet with a social worker before he or she leaves. Several social service groups work in the same building and can do same-day drug tests, detox, and counseling on-site.

Thomas O鈥橞rien, a senior assistant state鈥檚 attorney and the Hartford Community Court鈥檚 lead prosecutor, said he was a skeptic when he first volunteered to work in the court more than three years ago. Now he says he鈥檚 a convert.

鈥淚 love it. There鈥檚 more ability to adapt, to be creative with how you do your job here than almost anywhere else,鈥� he says.

Most of the judicial system, he says, tries to 鈥渟queeze people鈥� through the process. Traditional criminal courts can rush through a conviction that can have a permanent effect on a person鈥檚 life, including his or her ability to get a job, a house, or a loan.

A criminal court conviction can also fail to address what caused the person to commit the crime, Mr. O鈥橞rien adds. He uses shoplifting as an example, which many see as an impulsive, spur-of-the-moment crime.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a fascinating crime,鈥� he says. 鈥淧eople don鈥檛 just act out and go and do things. There鈥檚 a thought process leading up to it.

鈥淐ommunity courts take the time they need to talk to [perpetrators],鈥� he adds. 鈥淲e hold people accountable and then we give them a chance to redeem themselves.鈥�

Read more about Judge Norko and his work at the Hartford Community Court.