4.20 There is a growing interest in restorative justice as an alternative model of dealing with offenders. Restorative justice seeks to redefine crime, interpreting it not so much as breaking the law, or offending against the State, but as an injury or wrong done to another person. It encourages the victim and the offender to be directly involved in resolving any conflict through dialogue and negotiation. Thereby, the victim and the offender become central to the process with independent facilitators supporting a system that aims at offender accountability, full participation of both the victim and the offender and making good the wrong.
4.21 The Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, through the Probation and Welfare Service, currently supports two pilot restorative justice projects established in the last two years: the Victim/Offender Mediation Service, based in Tallaght, and the Nenagh Community Reparation Project. Both are managed by a partnership of local stakeholders in the criminal system and take referrals from the local courts.
● In the Victim/Offender Mediation Service, mediators meet separately with the offender and victim (if they want to participate) to explore what possibilities exist for reaching a settlement. Victim and Offender can meet face to face, with the mediator present, if they want to. When the process has reached its conclusion, the mediator provides a report to the
Probation and Welfare Officer who then brings it to the Court and the Judge makes a final decision on the case. The Project has a manager and administrator and there are nine victim/offender mediators. It has taken referrals from eight Judges and, in its first 18 months, has dealt with 32 cases.
● In the Nenagh model, on referral from the courts, the offender meets with a panel of four people: two representatives from the community, a member of the Garda Síochána and the Project Co-ordinator. The aim of the meeting is to allow the offender to express remorse and to try and agree a contract of reparation. Once agreed, the matter is brought to the Court for formal agreement and is adjourned for a specific period of time. On return to the Court, and if the reparation has been successfully fulfilled, the case is then disposed of. A Co-ordinator (who is the local Probation Officer) runs the project and there are 13 people on the panel of community representatives. The Project aims to deal with 24 cases in 2001 (its first full year of operation).
While these services have slightly different methods, their objectives are similar in that they challenge offenders to face up to their actions and to act constructively to make amends.
4.22 In addition to these projects, the Garda Síochána is supporting a pilot restorative justice scheme, operating in 40 locations around the country, focusing on juvenile offenders. These are currently being evaluated and the findings should be made available in the near future. Early indications from the Garda are that the general feedback is positive for both the victim and offender. Sixty-eight events have taken place and the offences include assault, criminal damage, larceny and nuisance calls.
4.23 These new initiatives have the potential to play an important role in breaking the cycle that leads from minor offences to serious crime and imprisonment. By making offenders take responsibility for their actions and become more aware of the effect of their actions on others, it is hoped that they will be less likely to re-offend. Restorative approaches also provide an opportunity for greater involvement by the victims of crime and the community more generally in addressing the wrong that has been done to them. In our consultations with Victim Support, they were very clear that while they were pro-victim this did not mean that they were anti-offender.
4.24 Justice must, of course, be applied in an even-handed way and the courts should not treat offenders differently depending on the particular attitude of the victim. It is also important that sufficient resources are made available to support the service, to train and support mediators, to facilitate community involvement and to undertake research and evaluation.
4.25 Equally, the public and the media should not consider diversionary and restorative justice programmes as ‘soft options’. These programmes should be rigorously applied, under the authority of the Court, involve the Probation and Welfare Service and any violation of conditions should be dealt with appropriately. Involving and informing the public (including victims of crime where possible) is crucial, as it is only through their backing that the alter- natives to imprisonment will be accepted and further developed.
4.26 The Team recommends that the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform should:
● continue to support restorative justice projects and that, in principle, additional projects should be established (subject to the evaluation findings of the two pilot projects);
● the potential use of restorative justice practices and interventions in prisons, particularly in a pre-release context and as part of Sentence Management should be further encouraged; and
● facilitate documentation of practice and outcomes and independent evaluation so as to share best practice and to develop understanding of the service (e.g. among the Judiciary and other parties within the criminal justice system; the community, voluntary and business sectors; education and youth organisations; and the general public).
Conclusion
4.27 In this Section of the Report we have seen that poverty and crime are linked and that improving life chances have an important bearing on reducing crime rates. Even if poverty is eliminated this would not mean the end of crime (including white collar crime), however, and so a consensus on appropriate ways to punish those who wrong others is required. We argue that this consensus should view the involvement of the community as central in achieving reparation.