Sometimes once is all it takes for people to realize they’ve started down the wrong road. The Ector County District Attorney’s office gets it and so offers certain defendants the opportunity to enter the Pre-trial Intervention Program.
Right now, roughly 500 first-time offenders are being given a chance to earn the dismissal of their charges by undergoing counseling, performing community service and paying fees.
The defendants, often young adults, have been charged with such things as theft, drug possession, driving while intoxicated, criminal trespass and family violence, said District Attorney Dusty Gallivan.
Cindy Weir Nutter began the program when she was county attorney and Gallivan said he decided to keep it going after seeing its success.
“It’s a good program. Everybody makes mistakes so it gives first-time offenders an opportunity to keep a conviction off their record,” he said. “The program is very similar to probation, it has a lot of the same rules and in some cases, there are additional rules. For example, if it’s a DWI, they’ve got to do counseling and some other stuff and if it’s a family violence, they have to do anger management.”
The participants are also subject to urine analysis and home visits by probation officers.
Most defendants must participate in the program for six to 12 months and if successful, the probation department will request the dismissal of their charges, Gallivan said.
Those who aren’t successful already know what the consequences will be as they are laid out at the beginning of the program, he said.
“They know going in, ‘OK, if I mess this up, I’m going to jail for so many days,’” Gallivan said.
Right now, Gallivan said his office is seeing a lot of misdemeanor possession of marijuana cases and those people have even more incentive to get involved in the PTI program.
“I understand people are becoming more and more accepting of marijuana, but if you get a possession of marijuana conviction, DPS could suspend your license, which is an unintended consequence,” Gallivan said.
Roughly 80% of participants successfully complete the program, which is slightly higher than those placed on probation, he said.
Gallivan once studied the recidivism rate for DWI offenders and it was less than 5%, he said.
Also in the plus column is the fact the program is self-funded, Gallivan said.
Participants have to pay an administrative fee and a $60 supervision fee, he said.
