Greg worked to bring the first Veterans Treatment Court in New England to Norfolk County in 2012. The Veterans Treatment Court prioritizes treatment over incarceration for those whose military service was followed by involvement in the criminal justice system - often rooted in substance abuse, mental health, or other issues associated with readjustment. Greg also helped implement and develop the Drug Court that has been working to stabilize lives and prevent re-offense through treatment, scaffolding, and intense supervision since 2001.


Greg is invested in supporting and expanding the use of specialized courts, like the Veterans Treatment Court and the Drug Court, in Norfolk County because they work. The targeted interventions, resources, and supervision provided by these courts make communities safer by preventing people from re-offending. They have a positive impact on the lives of defendants and their families and save taxpayer dollars.

Ten years after the first drug treatment court was founded in Miami, FL, the National Institutes of Justice (NIJ) did an evaluation of their effectiveness, including outcomes and costs. The full ten-year analysis found that one drug court they sampled was keeping people with substance use disorder from being re-arrested within two years for another felony by 70%. When the NIJ published its analysis of the second decade of drug courts, it found that participation in a Drug Court saved the system roughly $1,500 per person (including police and law enforcement costs, victimization costs, etc.). This doesn't take into account the cost in human suffering avoided by the successful participants, their families, and their children. It also doesn't take into account the monetary cost of foster care for those children had they re-offended or burial costs for those who would have overdosed without Drug Court.

Greg helped develop the Drug Court founded in Norfolk County the year he became an Assistant District Attorney. The office would go on to establish other specialty courts. Greg was most heavily involved in establishing the first Veterans Treatment Court in New England, seated at the Dedham district courthouse.

Military service, with or without combat exposure, changes those who go – often for the better. Sometimes, however, it creates problems when those men and women return and try to re-adjust to civilian life. Those difficulties sometimes simmer for years. A national study of over 22,000 veterans found that Veterans Treatment Court participants had better housing and employment outcomes as compared to other criminal justice-involved veterans. Another study found that participants have improved mental health, overall functioning, and social connectedness. As the court’s first presiding judge told the Boston Globe, “The goal of the court is to right the ship, as it were, and return them to the productive lives they led before.”

We owe our veterans no less.