Criminal justice: could there be better way?

By Ron Claassen, D.Min., and Arthur Wint, J.D.
September 18, 2006

If there was a way to modify our criminal justice system to increase offender accountability, increase victim satisfaction and reduce costs, would you want to try it?
 
When we describe what has come to be known as restorative justice (RJ), people always respond in the same way: “Why aren’t we trying it out here in Fresno?” 

But making any changes to our criminal justice system will require a high level of community support. If you put yourself in the shoes of our criminal justice leaders, the safest thing to do is to continue doing what we have always done and try to do it better. Yet, most people, including our criminal justice officials, are frustrated that punished offenders do not stop offending, that victims are upset at being left out or even re-victimized by our current processes and that the community feels helpless to change or improve those processes. We have asked our criminal justice system to punish offenders because we hope that the punishment will cause offenders to recognize violations and stop doing them. Punishment works for a few, but everyone knows this is not the case for those who commit most serious offenses.

Research indicates offenders stop offending when they decide to stop, when they have constructive alternatives and when they have people who they respect watching them and holding them accountable. This is what restorative justice does, while also supporting and including the victims.

So, what is being suggested by supporters of restorative justice is a system that takes this information into account. Restorative justice starts with the vision of making things as right as possible, rather then just punishing the offender. RJ recognizes that when a law has been violated, people have also been violated and invites the offender to accept responsibility and gather a support group to meet with the victim(s), community people and criminal justice representatives. If the offender agrees to accept responsibility, the meeting focus is to help him/her recognize the violation, take some constructive action to make things as right as possible with the victim, create a plan to prevent similar offending in the future and to be accountable to the support group and the criminal justice system for carrying out the plan. These meetings, similar to victim offender reconciliation program (VORP) meetings, are called community justice conferences (CJC). If the offender does not accept responsibly, then the court hears the case and determines a consequence.

When the juvenile justice system in New Zealand tried this they reduced the number of cases that needed a full court hearing by 75 percent and reduced the number of youth in lock-up facilities by 66 percent. They closed more than half of their lock-up facilities. When asked why the CJC’s didn’t incarcerate more youth, the groups indicated that they always want the offender to spend more time with people who will be a positive influence in their life and less time with those who would encourage antisocial behavior.

In the 2005-2006 school year, Fresno Pacific University tried out a form of RJ called restorative discipline. Of 19 cases, all of which would have been decided by a campus authority or judicial system, only one needed our judicial system. All others were resolved in community justice conferences. Resident directors and others responsible for discipline were skeptical at first, but soon were convinced that this system addressed core issues and rather then being soft on misbehavior, as feared, was constructive with the offenders and hard on misbehavior.

Supporters of restorative justice think this could be tried out here in Fresno. Building on 24 years of victim/offender mediation experience in Fresno County (over 7,000 cases), this fall the Restorative Justice Framework Committee invited criminal justice leaders and community leaders to develop a plan and the legislation to put it into action.

If you would like to see our community try out RJ, please call your criminal justice system officials and/or go to our website www.fresno.edu/pacs/rjp to register your support.

Ron Claassen, D. Min., is a professor at Fresno Pacific University and director of its Center for Peacemaking and Conflict Studies. He is also the founding director of the Victim Offender Reconciliation Program of the Central Valley and has consulted throughout the United States and internationally.

Arthur Wint, J.D., is a professor of criminology and coordinator of the peace and conflict studies program at California State University, Fresno. He is spending the fall semester of 2006 at FPU working on legislative aspects of restorative justice. Wint teaches criminology and PACS courses and is a mediator and board member of the Victim Offender Reconciliation Program (VORP) of the Central Valley. He has written on a number of related topics and is a core faculty member for the National Victim Assistance Academy.