Caught in the cycle: Why courts keep seeing the same faces | Sound Off

Published 1:30 am Saturday, July 11, 2026

By JUDGE RON COSTECK

One of the more pressing issues facing our District Court — and our community — is what many have come to call a “revolving door.” Individuals are arrested, brought before the court, and then released — sometimes with time served, sometimes with charges dismissed — only to return again and again.

Understanding this cycle requires context.

The revolving door often reflects deeper structural challenges, including chronic underfunding of courts, court staff, jails, prosecutors’ offices and law enforcement. It is also closely tied — though not exclusively — to housing instability. People experiencing homelessness arrive there by many paths: poverty, domestic instability, addiction and mental health. More often than not, these factors are intertwined.

I once asked a young man why he turned to drugs when it clearly would not help him escape his situation. His answer was simple: it helped him cope with being constantly hungry and cold.

When hope for long-term stability fades, immediate relief — no matter how harmful — can take its place. This is where homelessness, mental health challenges, and substance use intersect and compound one another, creating the most visible situations we see in our community.

Individuals in these circumstances are often among the least likely to seek or accept help voluntarily. As a result, District Courts can become a de facto point of last intervention — for both the individual and the broader community.

Often, that opportunity comes through low-level, nonviolent offenses such as shoplifting, trespassing or drug possession. These cases may appear minor, but they can represent critical opportunities to intervene and connect individuals with treatment and support.

A significant number of individuals appearing in these cases experience serious mental health conditions that impair their ability to understand legal proceedings or assist in their own defense. In such instances, prosecution is not permitted under the law.

Under state law, when competency is in question, a professional evaluation is required. If a court determines that a defendant is not competent, charges for non-serious misdemeanors must be dismissed.

For more serious misdemeanors, dismissal is also required unless competency restoration is requested by the prosecutor’s office. Even when pursued, restoration in custodial settings is limited to twenty-nine days in duration — substantially shorter than the timeframes available in felony cases. It does not take clinical expertise to recognize that mental health stabilization does not align neatly with the severity of a criminal charge. As a result, restoration in misdemeanor cases is often not pursued — and the revolving door continues.

The intent behind this framework is compassionate. We should not prosecute individuals who cannot defend themselves. Nor should we hold individuals in the criminal system solely to restore competency for the purpose of prosecuting low-level charges.

Yet the unintended consequence is a system that disengages at precisely the moment intervention is most needed.

When charges are dismissed without further intervention, individuals are often released back into the community with the same underlying challenges — untreated mental health issues, substance use or both. In these situations, the court lose the ability to require treatment, provide structured supervision or maintain jurisdiction long enough to support meaningful change.

The “revolving door” is therefore not solely a court issue. It reflects the intersection of criminal law, behavioral health systems, and statutory frameworks. Policies designed to safeguard individual rights may, in some cases, limit opportunities for timely intervention among individuals who repeatedly cycle through low-level offenses, remain disconnected from care and may commit more serious offenses in the future.

This tension underscores a broader policy question: how to balance due process protections with the need for effective, humane intervention.

The competency process often identifies individuals in the greatest need of help. I have seen the restoration process produce life-changing outcomes. I have looked at a restored defendant and seen what can only be described as an awakening—a fundamentally different person. While they still face prosecution, I have seen prosecutors and courts respond with a renewed sense of proportion and humanity to a different reality. I recently witnessed such a transformation, and it reaffirmed my sense of hope for the individual and the process.

I have also seen the limits of the process: brief periods of stability, temporary reductions in recidivism, and then the gradual return of the same cycle.

However, this should not discourage us — it should compel us. We should continue asking whether the current system is working, and if not, how it can be improved for both the individual and the community.

Addressing the revolving door will likely require coordination across multiple systems, including the courts, behavioral health services, housing resources and legislative policy. It may also require continued evaluation of how existing laws function in practice, particularly in cases involving low-level offenses and competency concerns.

The persistence of the revolving door suggests not a lack of concern, but a misalignment between existing systems and the realities they are intended to address. Whether the issue is funding of the criminal justice system or the competency processes, recognizing that gap is an important step toward developing more effective and balanced approaches.

Ron Costeck is the judge for Island County District Court.