Restorative Justice Through Victim-Offender Mediation: A Multi-Site Assessment

Source: (1998) Western Criminology Review 1(1).

The relatively new and emerging practice theory of restorative justice emphasizes the need to provide opportunities for those most directly affected by crime (victims, communities, and offenders) to be directly involved in responding to the impact of crime and restoring the losses incurred by victims. Victim-offender mediation, a process which allows crime victims to meet fact-to-face with the offender to talk about the impact of the crime and to develop a restitution plan, is the oldest and most empirically grounded restorative justice intervention. This article reports on a study of victim-offender mediation in four sites with juvenile offenders and their victims, along with related studies. High levels of victim and offender satisfaction with the mediation process have been found, along with high successful restitution completion rates and reduced fear among crime victims