Judge gives offenders option of church

[Amelia]

Judge gives offenders option of church

May 31, 2005

Boston Globe

LONDON, Ky. --A Kentucky judge has been offering some drug and alcohol offenders the option of attending worship services instead of going to jail or rehab -- a practice some say violates the separation of church and state.

District Judge Michael Caperton, 50, a devout Christian, said his goal is to "help people and their families."

"I don't think there's a church-state issue, because it's not mandatory and I say worship services instead of church," he said.

Alternative sentencing is popular across the country -- ordering vandals to repaint a graffiti-covered wall, for example. But legal experts said they didn't know of any other judges who give the option of attending church.

Caperton has offered the option about 50 times to repeat drug and alcohol offenders. It is unclear what effect the sentence has had.

David Friedman, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, said the option raises "serious constitutional problems."

"The judge is saying that those willing to go to worship services can avoid jail in the same way that those who decline to go cannot," Friedman said. "That strays from government neutrality towards religion."

[cricket]

My husband uses services from cotse.net. Anyone know what "cotse" stands for? Church of the Swimming Elephant.

Wonder if that would count toward worship???

[Nicodema]

Comments from people I know on this phenomenon (as we were discussing it in email yesterday):

B: And what if they choose to join Hare Krishnas or a a neo-pagan group? Do they count?

Myself: He "didn't say church", he "said worship services" -- so the article reads anyway. Presuming this would be religiously inclusive and a matter of choice on the part of the individual, this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Many alcohol and drug addictions are substitute panaceas for spiritual unrest to begin with, and addicts statistically benefit from spiritual & moral guidance as well as fellowship with supportive others, as the success of 12-step programs attests. Like as with the 12-step model, understanding of the Higher Power could be left open to be determined by the personal experience and conception of the individual. The judge might have avoided the fracas altogether by simply offering participation in a 12-step program as the alternative instead.

H: But there are ancillary problems to this proposed solution.

1) No applicable standards, and hence no way of monitoring compliance. If

this is to be a viable option to jail time, there needs to be a mechanism

for oversight. Otherwise, one could merely attend a basement gathering with

a few friends and call it the "Order Of The Holy Bong", or whatever. And

just such a thing WOULD be allowed under freedom of worshuip (sans the

substance usage implied, as that's illegal), which means that instituting

oversight could possibly abrogate religious freedom. Therefore it might be a

mutually exclusive situation, and thus non-viable.

2) There are existing substance abuse recovery program with proven success

rates, but they are woefully underfunded. They encounter the same issues

that sex education does - it works, but puritanical interests don't want it

funded, instead preferring to rely on "abstinence" programs and other

wishful constructs that depend on everyone's better nature always

prevailing.

3) It is still a breach of church-state separation, regardless of the fact

that no specific religion is endorsed, because religion ITSELF is being

touted as a solution IN PLACE of state institutions. To use a flawed but not

wholly inappropriate analogy, this would be like allowing your pastor to

ordain you to operate a motor vehicle, as opposed to using the state

apparatus designed to verify your competency to drive. (This goes back to

the point made in #1.)

4) Even if all these conditions weren't issues, I would still have a problem

with this because I believe it is not being proposed for the reasons listed,

but rather is yet another attempt to ease theocracy in through the back

door.

I do agree with you, this would have been a more palatable solution had the

judge offered the alternative of 12-step programs, as these have oversight

and track records that make them a teneble option. But the broadcloth

solution of "get you some god, boy" is to nebulous and ill-informed to be

practical.

B: That's what I am asking -- he said 'worship services' but does that include non-Judaeo-Islamic-Christian services?

H: (answering : I would guess that, legally, the answer is "yes". But practically, given the location, the answer is "no", since it's doubtful there are any other choices in the area under question.

And one needs to take into account the reality of the situation when

questioning why a decision was made, rather than just viewing the abstracts.

Often what sounds fine in theory ("you can get a job anywhere in town!")

breaks down in reality ("however, only the coal mine is still in business").

Myself: I was merely noting that the idea of obtaining spiritual guidance as a means to overcoming addictions is not necessarily a negative or invalid idea in itself. I'm not sure if it constitutes an attempt to sneak theocratic aims in the back door because I do not know and cannot judge the motives of the Judge in question personally and individually. The concern is certainly a valid one just knowing there are those that would exploit it in that direction even if the Judge himself happened to have had perfectly innocent motives and sincerely thought he was doing something good.

One thing that comes up in my mind is weighing this against the problem of over-incarceration created by the "drug war" itself, where minor offenders -- people guilty of getting high, possessing small quantities, etc. -- are being thrown in fed prisons for outrageously unfair sentence lengths. OK, so maybe this particular angle isn't THE solution -- maybe it's a rough draft with a lot of problems that needs a lot of reworking -- but it's nice to see SOMEBODY offering SOME alternative to the otherwise draconian sentences that get imposed, even a flawed one. Maybe in time it will lead to more workable solutions.

H: (answering me): Sure, and I didn't mean to sound argumentative, if such I seemed. I agree that rehabilitation, not incarceration, is the best solution to "crimes" like these. It just would have been nice if the judge had made a better defined statement of intent, rather than the generalized one he did. And I would still like to see the money go back into our recovery programs, and not into building more jails.