Eligibility criteria (includes but is not limited to):

• Your offending must have been driven by your alcohol or drug addiction

• You must plead guilty to all active charges

• You must not be facing charges of serious violence, sexual offending or arson

• You must not have a serious medical or mental health condition (other than your addiction) that would prevent participation in the Alcohol or Other Drug Treatment Court (AODTC)

• You must live within the jurisdiction of the Auckland or Waitākere District Courts

• Upon entering guilty pleas, you must be facing a term of imprisonment that is not longer than 3 years

• You must want to change your life.

Application to the Court must be made through your lawyer. If a judge accepts that your case, you will be remanded for three weeks for an assessment by an alcohol and other drug (AOD) clinician. Their role is to provide the court with information about your past, your alcohol and other drug use and any treatment you have previously received.

The judge may then remand you for one more week to appear in the Alcohol or other Drug Treatment Court for a determination hearing. It will then be up to the AODTC Judge to decide whether to offer you a place in the Court.

The Auckland and Waitākere Alcohol or Other Drug Treatment Courts can each only accept up to 50 participants.
There are no waiting lists which means that if the Court has filled the 50 places, any new applications will be declined. However, the numbers in the Court change regularly, so do apply if you are keen to have this chance, as there may be a place available at the time of your determination hearing.

If you are accepted into the AODTC you will be:

• Assigned a treatment case manager, a peer support worker (who is in recovery themselves) and a Court lawyer

• Given an individualised treatment plan. This may include a residential stay or community based treatment including counselling, parenting programmes, peer support groups and community work

• Supported to obtain a full driver’s licence, to get dental work if needed, and with tattoo removal (if required)

• Randomly tested for alcohol and other drugs at least five times every two weeks, including on weekends and public holidays

• Expected to complete and graduate from the AODTC programme which takes around 18 months. If you do graduate, you will then be sentenced to a community-based sentence (with intensive supervision) rather than a custodial sentence.