Restorative Justice in action: Debbie Warsing

One more extreme case of restorative justice is the case of Debbie Warsing. 

Im not going to go into details on the case due to it;s gruesome nature, but essentially Debbie Warsing was tortures for hours by her step-son, Kristian Lee Warsing, and then murdered her two children. (you can read more about the case here)

However, years later, Kristian tried to meet with Debra, and apologize. 

At first she was hesitant, but eventually she gave in and met her. When meeting him, Debbie found out that she was suffering from a mental illness at the time, and was depressed at the thought of his parents marriage falling apart, and killed the children to try and save them from that pain. 

While that is no where close to an excuse for the acts that were committed on that day, Kristian is not medicated for his mental illness and wanted to apologize to his step-mother directly. 

Debbie felt that he was truly sorry, and did one of the hardest things imaginable in her situation. she forgave him.

Today Kristian is trying to reintegrate himself into society and saving to go to university. However, without the chance to at least apologize for his actions, and show that he is truly sorry for what he has done, he may have had to spent the rest of his life in prison, and coming out possibly worse than he went in. 

Here You can see debbie talk about the traumatic events and what their situation is like now. 

Sources: 

http://curio.ca.library.sheridanc.on.ca/en/restorative-justice-capacity-for-forgiveness/s/1054/

http://www.thefreepress.ca/news/185247972.html

Retributive Justice vs Restorative Justice

Restorative justice and retributive justice and virtually opposites of each other.

Restorative justice involves crime against an individual as well as the community while retributive justice involves crime that focuses primarily on the individual criminal.

With restorative justice, a criminal has the opportunity to become an appropriate member of society again. With the help of rehabilitation and restorative facilities, the criminal may truly realize the harm and danger he caused during his acts of crime and learn from his behavior and mistakes to understand his wrong doings and accept his punishment.

Retributive justice makes the criminal receive punishment without the criminal knowing what he did was wrong towards society. The criminal may think the crime was part of his normal day without being able to learn about his errors. This misconception can cause the criminal to form a hatred towards authority because he feels like the punishment is due to personal reasons and not his criminal activity.

This individual can be sentenced for x amount of years and return to society not one bit changed and may repeat acts of criminal behavior. But a criminal going through restorative justice can learn and realize the effects they have caused on the victim and their family. This method also allows the criminal to resolve issues with the victim and come to a conclusion with the situation. Both parties may come to a mutual understanding bringing the victim to accept what has happened in the past and the criminal to learn from his mistakes and be able to become a rational member of society.

While many people believe that restorative justice is too easy on offenders, and that they require more punishment, I believe that you should ask yourself, is it better for a person to not commit a crime because they understand what they're doing, and do not want to cause their community harm, or because they are afraid of what might happen if they get caught?

Sources: 

http://www.cscsb.org/restorative_justice/retribution_vs_restoration.html

Negative effects of retributive justice

One topic i'd also like to write about is retributive justice. Retributive justice is a system that punishes criminals, rather than focusing on their rehabilitation.

While this system may give the victim some temporary relief that that offender has been punished, it also has the risk of turning someone who had a more minor charge, or even someone who made an honest mistake into a hardened criminal. 

By sending the person into a prison, where the majority of the people they meet and interact with on a daily basis are other criminals, they may learn how to commit more serious and dangerous crimes. 

the satire cartoon Family Guy actually went over this in one of their episodes. In the episode, Meg, the teenage daughter of the family, went to prison. when she was released, she turned into a serious criminal who assaulted and robed many people, including her own family

Note: the above clip is extremely violent and uses strong language. 

While that clip may be an extreme example, it is not far from the truth. many people that are sent to jail actually come out worse than they were before. in fact, in the last 3 months of 2007, 75% of adult inmates released from a provincial jail were charged with another offence within 2 years. 

Sources: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ejvh43ogvg

http://www.npr.org/2013/02/01/169732840/when-crime-pays-prison-can-teach-some-to-be-better-criminals

http://www.torontosun.com/news/columnists/tom_brodbeck/2010/03/02/13089631.html

The Youth Criminal Justice Act and Restorative Youth Conferencing

The youth criminal justice act governs Canadian youth between the ages of 12-18 who have committed a criminal offence. 

Children between these ages are still growing, and maturing as people, and may not recognize the full extent to their actions. However, punishing a child the same way an adult may be punished may hinder their ability to ever lead a "normal" life, and may actually cause more harm in the long run. 

The Canadian government realized, this and as a result implemented the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA). 
The Youth Criminal Justice Act tends to lean towards restorative justice in a way of punishment. 

to read more on the Youth Criminal Justice Act click here

One of the most popular tactics used is known as Restorative Youth Conferencing. 

Restorative youth conferencing is essentially a mix of victim-offender conferencing and restorative conferencing. The offending youth (and their parents/guardians) meet with the victim, police, a conference co-coordinator, and if appropriate, community representatives.

During these conferences, the victim and the offender discuss how to make amends, and how to prevent these events from happening again. Additionally, like normal restorative justice, the victims are able to express how they feel about the harm that may have been caused. 

According to research conducted by Morris and Maxwell, there was only a 26% re conviction rate with young offenders in New Zealand. (note: the program only dealt with moderate and serious offences) 

 "In conferences where the restorative elements were achieved - such as meeting with the victim and the offender, apologizing, and showing remorse - there were more likely to result in reduced re offending rates" (compared with court disposals).

Sources

http://search.credoreference.com.library.sheridanc.on.ca/content/entry/willanyouthj/restorative_youth_conferencing/0

http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/cj-jp/yj-jj/ycja-lsjpa/back-hist.html

http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/jsp-sjp/rr00_16/p3.html

What is restorative justice?

What really is restorative justice? you may ask. 
Restorative justice is a fairly simple term many people may be able to just the gist of  simply by hearing it's name. 

Restorative- Having the ability to restore health, strength, or well-being  (source)

Justice- The administration of the law or authority in maintaining this (source)

Meaning, restorative justice is about taking a criminal, and turning them back into a member of society. 

However, restorative justice often goes further than that. It is not just about reintegration of the offender, but also making them realize the damages they may have caused, and giving the community a chance to express how the crime has affected them.

This is all achieved by practices such as victim-offender mediation

and restorative conferencing 

Eventually, the victim and offender may be able to come to an agreement on how the harm can be repaired, generally either repayment for the damage, or community service.

In addition to this, restorative justice also has one more big benefit, finding the root of the problem. 

By having the offender discuss their problem, and why they committed their crime, communities are able to adapt, try to make it so that these problems do not arise again in the future.

Sources:

http://www.csc-scc.gc.ca/restorative-justice/003005-0004-eng.shtml

http://search.proquest.com.library.sheridanc.on.ca/docview/348284216?pq-origsite=summon

http://search.credoreference.com.library.sheridanc.on.ca/content/entry/willanyouthj/restorative_justice/0