Restorative Justice Paper Review

Restorative Justice

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Restorative Justice

Restorative justice is a body under laws and regulations that views crime as more than it is where it causes damage to people, relations and the entire public. In this, they make a response to any wrong doers at a point where they are prepared in the best method to participate in getting justice. They achieve by it requesting the complainants and the victims to a forum for them to discuss harms and how they can avoid it later and also how to resolve them. Most times, the meetings are fruitful and lead to transformational changes in people’s lives (Lauritsen, 2018).  This paper will give details on the concept of restorative justice, discuss the interpersonal relationships of the characters, and how they restore their relationships and what roles faith or spiritual practice take in those relationships.

From the films and novels we have gone through in class lessons, it is clear that people get to have issues with their peers their institutional and interpersonal relationships are affected. Therefore, the restorative justice reaches to the affected individuals in the communities and come up with ways of addressing the interpersonal dimension of wrongdoing and integrity. This is majorly done in three dimensions where the offenders admit accountability for the crime and restricted parties offer to join. First dimension is the victim-offender intervention, which a practice that gives an involved victim a chance to safely meet their offender and engage in a discussion through a trained mediator (Wilson, Olaghere & Kimbrell, 2018). In this forum, the roles of restorative justice party is to permit the two to voluntarily come to a solution, encourage the criminal to learn the effect of their offense and take full accountability for the resultant harm and if possible give them an chance to strategize an idea that will address the harm.

The second dimension is the family or public group conferencing which is a procedure that unites the victim, the criminal and their family and friends. In this setting, the two groups have a chance to include their supporters where assist in coming up with decisions on how to address the consequences of the wrongdoing. The conferencing then gives them a chance to be directly involved in giving their responses regarding the wrongdoing, increases the offender’s consciousness on the impacts of their behaviour and engages the offender’s support system who begins their journey of shaping their future behaviors (Wilson, Olaghere & Kimbrell, 2018). The last dimension is the peacemaking or punishing circles, which is a designed procedure that develops agreement among the society, victims and their supporters, offenders and their supporters, magistrates, prosecuting attorney, the defense advisors, the court and the police among other interested parties. These parties work together to endorse restoration of the affected, they give the criminal a chance to amend their mistakes and end up with constructive resolutions.

Restorative justice works under well designed steps which are in educational disciplines and have proved to be effective in building stronger people. These processes are stipulated in three levels where first, there is empathy for all and by all which gives awareness that a harm was done to a person or community (Wilson, Olaghere & Kimbrell, 2018). There is also a mumbled ‘sorry’ is not enough slogan which is a moderated process that assists the accused to understand the wrong they did and the rights of the offended and lastly the everyone is involved in the healing process which includes a dialogue with all the parties and move on together with a positive impact.

The kinds of crimes that have been committed to people and require restorative justice include property criminalities, person-based faults without physical damage and serious cases like death. In most cases, the offenders are first time and are assessed to medium risk and they usually don’t have longer criminal histories. When engaged in the restorative justice processes, they can be advised on ways to take responsibility of their behaviors and restore their character forever. However, the victims’ attitudes and feelings towards the offender are affected and they live in hatred and vengeance towards them. In some cases, we find that the offenders are people well known to the victims and from their relationships they have a chance to commit some crimes. The victim then lives with fear, anger, resentments, hatred and a negative attitudes towards the offender.

To restore their relationships with their family, friends and the community the roles of restorative justice must then be applied. Being a body under the criminal and justice department, their main role is to include all the parties. In inclusion, there is a punitive justice system which settles the difference between the suspect and the state. In this part, the victim has no role to play apart from attending the court’s reports and the honesty process. Next, they encounter the parties, on basis of agreement and deliberate the crime and the possible impacts and drafts their way forward where the parties must not meet.

The other role is making agendas where they consider the two parties mostly the victim with an aim of restoring their relationship with the offender. This is done in restitution process as ordered by the law court or as approved by the victim and the offended. Finally, there is reintegration where both the victim and the offender are assisted to reintegrated back to their communities (Taylor, 2018). In this case, other professionals are engaged like the mental health professionals, peers from support networks, social workers and faith leaders among others who all work for the betterment of the offender.

When all the roles and responsibilities are implemented, and the community is fully engaged, there are interpersonal and institutional relationship restored. Some of these benefits to the community include, increased safety where there is recidivism, cost effectiveness since crime approaches needs a lot of resources to manage and maintain the criminal justice system in the community and there is also a stronger community where is enhanced by a wellbeing town or religion, and also the community justice centers who assist in the establishment of active citizens who volunteer to build cohesive communities and neighborhoods. Benefits to the victim include, opportunities to make it right, where they have a chance to apologize to the victims, have improved personal relationships with their community since they make important and significant changes and move on, have time resolution where the restorative justice profess in unison with the criminal justice system makes meaningful changes in their lives and have a high success rate which is after complete compliance and voluntary agreement in changing their lives for the better (Taylor, 2018).

Though there are provisions under the law on how restorative justice should be executed, faith and other spiritual practices have roles to play to impact the society. Since faith communities are present all over, they encourage the victims and offenders to uphold their beliefs and traditions for them to come to resolutions (Mackay, n.d.). For instance, Christianity is full of traditions and ways in which people can care for other people’s needs like in the story of the Good Samaritan, the act of Jesus forgiving and accepting a thief on the cross among others. They therefore urge the community to accept the offenders when they are sorry for the wrongs done.

In other cases, some have care groups, society groups and small faith groups who offer alliance, material assistance and divine or moral guidance to the offenders in their community to assist them in faster healing (Mackay, n.d.). They also teach them the ways of becoming a God fearing person who will also keep them away from repeating the offense or even committing another offence that might take them through the restorative justice. By doing this, their relationships are fully restored and live peacefully with their people.

In conclusion, Restorative justice is a body under laws and regulations that views crime as more than it is where it causes damage to people, relations and the entire public. It is done in three dimensions which are the victim-offender intervention, the family or public group conferencing and the peacemaking or punishing circles. These processes are stipulated in three levels where first, there is empathy for all and by all which gives awareness that a harm was done to a person or community. The kinds of crimes that have been committed to people and require restorative justice include property criminalities, person-based faults without physical damage and serious cases like death. To restore their relationships with their family, friends and the community the roles of restorative justice must then be applied. When all the roles and responsibilities are implemented, and the community is fully engaged, there are interpersonal and institutional relationship restored. In this case, other professionals are engaged like the mental health professionals, peers from support networks, social workers and faith leaders among others who all work for the betterment of the offender.

References

Lauritsen J. (2018). Restorative Justice. https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396607/obo-9780195396607-0047.xml

Mackay R. (n.d). Restorative Justice and the Churches. https://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/images/stories/committees/fcdc/inquiries/57th/Child_Abuse_Inquiry/Submissions/Mackay_Robert.pdf

Taylor L. (2018). The Importance of Restorative Justice. https://madison365.com/the-importance-of-restorative-justice/

Wilson B.,  Olaghere A. & Kimbrell C. (2018). Effectiveness of restorative Justice principles in juvenile justice. A meta-analysis. https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/grants/250995.pdf

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