ABSTRACT
In a comprehensive approach to (the reintegration of) offenders, the cooperation between law enforcement and treatment has become increasingly important (Bond and Gittell 2010, Williams 2009). This is particularly the case for problematic drug users and mentally ill offenders (Williams 2009, Morrissey, Fagan and Cocozza 2009). A merely repressive reaction to this type of offenders has not produced desirable results such as the reduction of substance use and drug related offences or the treatment of mental illness (Bull 2005, De Wree et al. 2009). The problems relating to substance use provide a clear illustration. Substance use is highly prevalent in prisons (Bullock 2003, Kanato 2008), and incarceration, as opposed to community sanctions, increases the likelihood of (drug related) recidivism (Bales and Piquero 2012, Mears, Cochran and Bales 2012). In contrast, imposing judicial alternatives to imprisonment on substance using offenders contains an opportunity to divert them to community (drug) treatment services. As a result, drug users are orientated to treatment by the law enforcement actors in order to divert (drug) offenders away from crime and drugs (De Wree, De Ruyver and Pauwels 2009). Consequently, the cooperation between criminal justice and health and social services has become increasingly important.1
