“I am extremely excited for this invaluable opportunity, as our Veterans Treatment Court has been in operation since 2019 and we currently have six graduates,” Pulaski Superior Court Judge Crystal Brucker Kocher notes. “Our dedicated team is constantly learning how to keep our community safe through this program while restoring veterans who served our country with honor. Constant reflection, training, and evaluation by experts in this field provides us the foundation to serve our community to the best of our ability, resulting in better programming for substance abuse, mental health, and criminal behavior for our participants and all justice involved individuals, allowing us to make our community safer for everyone.”
The Bureau of Justice Assistance and the Justice for Vets program host this very intensive training for Veterans Courts across the county. Courts are required to submit an in-depth application consisting of questions relating to each program, current data to support specific needs, and outcomes. Justice for Vets selected Pulaski County Veterans Treatment Court for this training.
“We have been an operational Veterans Court program for almost two years. We are still learning, and this is an amazing opportunity for our program,” said Dr. Natalie Tucker, Veterans Court coordinator. “The training not only benefits those working on behalf of the veterans but also the veterans and their families as they work their way through this intensive court program. We are very humbled to be awarded this training and very excited to learn and improve our current program.”
This training will provide the Superior Court and the Veterans Court Team with much needed program assistance, guidance and further programmatic development.
Numerous online meetings and conference calls take place from January through August. Then a virtual training will take place in September.
The Pulaski County Veterans Treatment Court was certified in 2019 and was the 100th “problem solving” court in the state to achieve certification. Problem solving court programs have been thoroughly researched and are data driven. They are the most effective court program nationally.
For more information about the Pulaski County Veterans Treatment Court, or if you are a veteran who would like to serve as a mentor for the program, you can learn about these opportunities by viewing the program’s webpage at http://gov.pulaskionline.org/pulaski-county-veterans-treatment-court/.
News release submitted by Dr. Natalie Tucker, Veterans Court coordinator
