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What is a Sobriety Court?

Simply Put: Sobriety Court is a DWI accountability court dedicated to changing the behavior of DWI Offenders through intensive supervision and treatment.

Punishment, unaccompanied by treatment and accountability, is an ineffective deterrent for repeat offenders.

The outcome for the offender is continued dependence on alcohol; for the community, continued peril. A new strategy exists to fight these hardcore impaired drivers, generally called "DWI Courts" or "DWI/Drug Courts."

A DWI Court is an accountability court dedicated to changing the behavior of the repeat offenders arrested for DWI.

The goal of DWI Court or DWI/Drug Court is to protect public safety by using the highly successful Drug Court model that uses accountability and long-term treatment to address the root cause of impaired driving: alcohol and other substance abuse.

Recognizing that treating repeat DWI offenders is complex and requires a combination of countermeasures is just as, important as understanding that the type and timing of the intervention is critical to curbing these offenders' illegal and dangerous behaviors (National Association of State Judicial Educators, 2004). This is consistent with a National Traffic Safety Board report which suggests the importance of quickly identifying and intervening with those drivers having the highest rates of alcohol-impaired driving (Quinlan et al., 2005)

With the repeat offender as its primary target population, DWI Courts follow Defining Drug Courts: The Key Components (NADCP, 1997) and the more recent Guiding Principles of DWI Courts.

Unlike Drug Courts, however, DWI Courts operate within a post-conviction model. This notion is supported in a resolution by National Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) stating "MADD recommends that DUI/DWI Courts should not be used to avoid a record of conviction and/or license sanctions."

In addition to MADD the following organizations have also passed resolutions in support of DWI Courts:

• The Governor's Highway Safety Association (GHSA);
• The Highway Safety Committee for the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP);
• The National Alcohol Beverage Control Association (NABCA);
• The National Association of Prosecutor Coordinators (NAPC);
• The National District Attorneys Association; and,
• The National Sherriff's Association (NSA).

As of December 2009, there are 172 designated DWI Courts. In addition, there are another 354 Hybrid DWI/Drug Courts in operation. (A Hybrid DWI/Drug Court is one that started out as a Drug Court that now also takes DWI Offenders) That brings the total number of specialized courts dealing with repeat impaired drivers to 526.