House moves bill to standardize veterans’ treatment courts
Modeled after drug treatment courts, veterans’ treatment courts are non-adversarial. Participants are required to make frequent court appearances and undergo routine drug and alcohol screening.
Rep. Patt Maney
The House has approved a bill that would streamline and clarify procedures for Florida’s veterans’ treatment courts.
The House on Thursday voted 114-0 to approve HB 845 by Republican Rep. Patt Maney, a retired Okaloosa judge.
“This is a veterans’ court bill, it simply aligns the veterans’ courts with the processes and procedures in other specialty courts, like the drug courts and mental health courts,” Maney told his House colleagues.
Among other things, the bill repeals a requirement that a state attorney approve a defendant’s application before he or she can participate in the program. Instead, the bill authorizes a court, “in consultation with an interdisciplinary team,” to make the determination.
Modeled after drug treatment courts, veterans’ treatment courts are non-adversarial. Participants are required to make frequent court appearances and undergo routine drug and alcohol screening.
Under the existing law, a participant must have a “service-related mental health condition, service-related traumatic brain injury, service-related substance use disorder, or service-related psychological problem or has experienced military sexual trauma.”
A retired Army general, Maney is credited with establishing Florida’s first veterans’ treatment court in 2010 in Okaloosa County.
Maney told the House Intergovernmental Affairs Committee earlier this month that the program grew out of a docket he established as an Okaloosa County judge after he returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan.
The Legislature approved a statewide veterans’ treatment court program in 2012. The bill is necessary, Maney said, to standardize procedures as more courts establish programs.
“Our courts have kind of gotten different procedures because they were created at different times and this just makes the process similar,” Maney said.
Clarifying that a court makes the final eligibility determination, in consultation with an interdisciplinary team, will clear up some confusion, Maney said.
“It gives all the interdisciplinary teams the same stature they started out with,” Maney said. “Hopefully, we’ll reduce friction between the stakeholders.”
The bill has been amended several times.
Republican Rep. Berny Jacques, a Clearwater attorney and former prosecutor, expressed a concern when Maney presented an earlier version of the bill to the Criminal Justice Subcommittee.
The earlier version lacked a reference to the interdisciplinary team.
“The concern would be having the state attorney also involved; we wouldn’t want to have judicial activism run amok,” Jacques said. “Any kind of balance there would be helpful. It’s a good bill and I’m looking forward to it becoming better.”
Maney assured the committee that bill would be amended.
“The purpose of the bill is to clarify the state attorney does intake on applicants for veterans’ treatment court, the judge makes that final decision, with the input of the defense attorney and the state attorney, and that’s not currently clear,” he said.
Another provision of the bill clarifies that an eligible defendant may be admitted into a VTC program at any stage of a criminal proceeding.
“It also clarifies that veterans’ courts can handle people in both pre-adjudicatory and post adjudicatory status,” Maney told the House.
The bill is supported by the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Florida Department of Veterans Affairs, and the conservative-leaning Florida Smart Justice Alliance.
Before it garnered unanimous House approval, HB 845 cleared three House committees without a negative vote.
However, it’s future remains uncertain.
A Senate companion, SB 1724 by Sen. Tom Wright, R-Port Orange, failed to get a hearing.
The House bill has been referred to the Senate Fiscal Policy Committee.
