Evaluation of the Court-Referred Restorative Justice Pilot: Case Studies.

Source: (2005) Wellington, New Zealand: Ministry of Justice. Downloaded 12 August 2005.

Eighteen court-referred restorative justice conferences – 10 from Auckland and Waitakere and four from both Dunedin and Hamilton – were identified as potential case studies. In these, all participants and both facilitators were contacted for their views about the court-referred restorative justice conference. The conferences were chosen to reflect cultural sensitivity, the involvement of professionals, healing and reconciliation. They include conferences with offenders who had committed very serious as well as less serious offences; with a number of victims present as well as victims on their own; with a number of offenders present as well as offenders on their own; with recidivist offenders as well as first time offenders; with offenders and victims of different ethnicities as well as the same ethnicity; and with both male and female offenders and victims. Extracts from these case studies are referred to in the Report to demonstrate points being made. All names used in the case studies and other identifying features have been changed. (excerpt)