Judge Joanne M. Smith was appointed to the Ramsey County District Court in 1983 and served until her retirement in 2015. She presently serves as a Senior Judge for the State of Minnesota.

Judge Smith has worked in the Drug Court field since 2001 when she started the Ramsey County Juvenile Drug Court and then the Ramsey County Adult Substance Abuse Court in 2002. In addition, Judge Smith started the Ramsey County District Court Initiative on Chemical Dependency in 1998. She served as Chair of the Supreme Court Chemical Dependency Task Force from 2005-2007 and was a member of the Supreme Court’s Drug Court Initiative Advisory Committee. She received her J.D. from Hamline University School of Law.

Judge Tilsen was on the Ramsey County bench in the Second Judicial District from 1999 to 2020, and now sits as a Senior Judge for the State of Minnesota.

Judge Tilsen has served as presiding Judge for Juvenile Substance Abuse Court, Adult Substance Abuse Court, Veterans Treatment Court, DWI Court, and Mental Health Court in Ramsey County.

She is a former board member of Criminal Defense Services, Inc. and currently serves on the board of the SOBER Foundation and the Veteran's Defense Project.

Judge Tilsen got her J.D, from University of Minnesota Law School. Prior to her time on the bench she was employed with the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office and the Ramsey County Public Defender’s Office.

Dan Guerrero is a criminal defense attorney with Meshbesher & Spence in Minneapolis. For the past 30 years, he has been assisting people who have found themselves in trouble with the law.

Helping others who have issues relating to drugs, alcohol or mental health has been a constant in his practice, and his dedication to the participants of the specialty courts of Ramsey County has come quite naturally for him. He has been a SOBER Board member since 2015.

Shannon Fette is a Ramsey County Community Corrections supervisor working in St. Paul, MN. Ms. Fette started in Ramsey County working with pre-trial services in 1998. She furthered her career when she was employed in Ramsey County Community Corrections in 2001. Ms. Fette joined the Ramsey County Adult Substance Abuse Court in 2009 as a case manager/probation officer. While in this position, the Drug Court team was one of ten mentor courts known for following best practices as well as implementing an internal mental health clinic. Ms. Fette continues to enhance her skills with supervision of four treatment courts as well specializing with gender specific casework and is a lead trainer for risk assessments.

Ann Kahn has been an Assistant Ramsey County Attorney since 2011. For much of her career as a prosecutor, she has worked in alternatives to traditional court responses. Ann has represented the county as the treatment court prosecutor in all four of the Ramsey County Treatment Courts—Mental Health Court, Veterans Treatment Court and Adult Substance Abuse Court.

Since 2020, she has worked as the prosecutor in Ramsey County’s Second Chance Initiative team, an evidence-based adult felony diversion program. She also works to engage community-based restorative justice practices.

Ann has been a SOBER Board member since 2017.

Heidi Heinzel is the Director of Grants and Subsidies Unit at the Minnesota Department of Corrections and has worked in the field of Corrections since 1999 in the areas of juvenile probation, intensive DWI probation, drug court probation, and most recently was the coordinator of the Adult Substance Abuse Court in Ramsey County, MN. Heidi also coordinated the Ramsey County DWI Court, Juvenile Drug Court and Veterans Treatment Court.

Under her coordination, Ramsey County Substance Abuse Court was named one of ten Adult Mentor Courts in the United States in both 2010 and 2013.

Cullin Smith is the Executive Director and Chief Counsel of Neighborhood Justice Center, a legal service corporation that has been providing comprehensive criminal defense services to low-income and indigent people in the East Metro area with a focus on communities of color since 1973.

Cullin has been with NJC for over a decade, first serving as a Staff Attorney and Director of Community Outreach, and in 2013 was named Executive Director by NJC’s Board of Directors.

Cullin manages the defense legal services for all Ramsey County Treatment Courts and serves on the Ramsey County Treatment Court Steering Committee. He received his law degree from William Mitchell College of Law.