Vermont Ending Court Backlog Experiment Before Measuring If It Actually Worked

State moved 400 cases in three months but didn't track whether defendants were convicted, cases were dismissed, or anyone reoffended.

Hundreds of Vermonters have been stuck in the criminal justice system with multiple cases pending against them at the same time—some with five, ten, or even more charges waiting to be resolved. Under Vermont’s normal court process, these cases moved slowly. A defendant might wait three months between court hearings, then another three months, then another. Cases could drag on for years.

Last fall, state officials tried something different in Burlington. They created a special court process to move these cases much faster—bringing defendants back to court every single week instead of every few months. The goal was to resolve hundreds of pending cases quickly and reduce the massive backlog clogging Vermont’s courts.

By early January, officials reported they had “resolved” roughly 400 of the 900 cases they were targeting. Governor Phil Scott’s administration presented this to legislators as a success story.

But there’s a significant problem: Vermont is ending the program next month without measuring what really matters. Officials didn’t track whether those 400 “resolved” cases resulted in convictions that held people accountable, or whether charges were simply dismissed to clear the books. More importantly, they didn’t measure whether any of the defendants went on to commit new crimes.

Now the three-month experiment is scheduled to end in February before anyone can determine if it actually improved public safety or just processed paperwork faster.

What “Resolved” Could Mean

When state officials say they “resolved” 400 cases, that term covers many different outcomes that have very different meanings for public safety.

A case could be resolved because:

• The defendant pleaded guilty and went to jail

• The prosecutor dropped the charges

• The case was sent to a restorative justice program

• Multiple charges were dismissed in exchange for pleading guilty to just one

All of these count the same way in the statistics as one “resolved” case. But they don’t have the same impact on accountability or community safety.

Here’s why this matters for the Burlington program specifically: The special court focused on people with five or more pending cases each. Imagine a defendant with ten separate criminal charges. Under this system, prosecutors could offer what’s called a “global resolution”—plead guilty to two charges, and we’ll dismiss the other eight.

That clears ten cases from the court’s records in one hearing. It shows up in the data as ten “resolved” cases. But it’s really just one conviction and eight dismissals.

Jaye Johnson, the Governor’s General Counsel, presented the 400 resolved cases figure to the House Committee on Corrections and Institutions, but didn’t break down how many were convictions versus dismissals versus other outcomes. Without that breakdown, Vermonters can’t judge whether the program delivered real accountability or just cleared a backlog by letting many charges go.

The Question Nobody Measured

Even more important than how cases were resolved is what happened next: Did the defendants stop committing crimes?

That’s the question an “accountability” program should ultimately answer. If bringing people to court every week—instead of every three months—made them less likely to reoffend, then the program succeeded. If defendants just went back to the same behavior after their cases were resolved, then the court was simply processing people faster through a revolving door.

But Vermont didn’t measure this. The program started in October 2025, handled most cases by early January 2026, and is scheduled to end in February 2026. That’s not enough time to know if anyone’s behavior changed.

When researchers study whether criminal justice programs work, they typically track people for at least six months to a year after their cases end to see if they get arrested again. Vermont is shutting down this program after about four months—before that kind of measurement is even possible.

Tim Lueders-Dumont, who represents Vermont’s prosecutors, seemed to recognize this limitation when he told legislators: “We’re not going to say mission accomplished.”

How the New Process Worked

The special court operated differently from Vermont’s normal criminal court process in several key ways:

Normal Vermont court: A defendant might see a different judge each time they appeared. Court dates were scheduled months apart. If someone had multiple cases, they might have different public defenders handling different charges.

The new process: One judge handled all of a defendant’s cases. The same prosecutor and defense attorney worked together on everything. Most importantly, defendants came back to court every single week, not every three months.

The idea behind weekly court dates came from different theories about what might help. Some officials thought frequent hearings would put pressure on defendants to take their cases seriously and accept plea deals. Others, like Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George, suggested that weekly dates might actually help people stay out of trouble by giving them structure and making it easier to remember when to show up.

The program also brought together prosecutors, defense attorneys, judges, and social service workers to coordinate on each defendant’s cases—a team approach rather than the normal adversarial system.

Why This Problem Exists

The most striking number from the program reveals just how concentrated the problem is: 28% of all pending criminal cases statewide involve people who each have five or more separate cases pending. That means a relatively small number of people account for more than a quarter of Vermont’s entire criminal court backlog.

This suggested that Vermont might not need to overhaul its entire court system—it might just need a better way to handle this specific group of high-volume repeat offenders.

What Happens When the Program Ends

The February phase-out creates immediate practical problems. The special court used dedicated resources: one judge assigned only to these cases, a special prosecutor, a designated defense attorney, weekly time slots in a specific courtroom. When February arrives, all of those people and resources return to handling regular court business.

Any defendants who still have pending cases will go back to the normal system—seeing different judges, waiting three months between hearings, having multiple attorneys if they have multiple charges. If the weekly structure was actually helping keep people on track, that benefit disappears.

More significantly for understanding whether the program worked: Vermont loses the ability to compare outcomes. Without tracking the people who went through this program—and comparing them to similar defendants who went through the regular court process—there’s no way to know if the weekly hearings made any difference in behavior.

The program demonstrated that Vermont’s courts can move much faster when they’re organized differently. That’s valuable information. What remains unknown is whether moving faster produced better results or just different ones.

The Cost Question

State officials haven’t disclosed how much the program cost to operate. Did it require paying overtime? Hiring additional staff? Pulling resources from other priorities?

Knowing whether Vermont spent $50,000 or $500,000 to resolve those 400 cases would help legislators and the public evaluate whether this approach makes financial sense if expanded to other counties or made permanent in Burlington.

Without cost information, it’s impossible to judge whether the investment delivered value beyond simply clearing a backlog.

Different Ways to Define Success

Part of the measurement problem stems from different people having different goals for the program.

For court administrators drowning in paperwork, clearing 400 cases in three months represents real progress. For judges and prosecutors managing overwhelming caseloads, faster case processing means they can shift attention to other matters.

But for legislators trying to address public safety, and for Vermonters concerned about crime in their communities, the relevant measure isn’t speed—it’s whether the outcomes made communities safer.

Johnson, the Governor’s Counsel, described incarceration as “a place where people have the opportunity to heal” in her legislative testimony. This framed the program as therapeutic rather than purely punitive. But the program collected no data on whether defendants received treatment, accessed support services, or experienced any “healing.”

The disconnect between what was promised and what was measured creates a situation where officials can declare success by some standards while leaving the most important public questions unanswered.

What This Means for Vermont

Vermont tried an experiment in moving criminal cases faster and is ending it before learning what really happened. Officials can point to 400 resolved cases as evidence of progress. But without knowing whether those resolutions meant convictions or dismissals, and without tracking whether defendants reoffended, the public has no way to judge if the program improved safety or just improved statistics.

The February shutdown means these questions may never be answered. The defendants have moved through the system. The data that could show whether they committed new crimes won’t be collected. The comparison that could show whether the weekly process worked better than the normal process won’t be made.

Vermont now faces decisions about whether to make this approach permanent in Burlington, expand it to other counties, or abandon it entirely—all based on incomplete information about what the three-month trial actually accomplished.

The experiment proved Vermont’s courts can work faster. Whether they can work better remains unknown.