Strategic use of questions, when facilitating talking circles
September 11, 2010
….I have some great coworkers, who are picking up quickly and I want to share a recent set of questions designed for a Circle to build community in a drug court program. Phase One: If you weren’t here right now, where would you be? Who is your favorite super hero and why? What is...
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Breaking Florida’s school-to-jail pipeline: Alternative approaches to student discipline and punishment
September 11, 2010
A student’s acceptance of responsibility is a cornerstone of the program. He or she appears before a trained board that reviews the incident and decides on sanctions. School Accountability Boards (SABs) involve the students, their parents or guardians, victims and others affected by the...
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Parallel Justice for Victims of Crime
September 11, 2010
In coining the term the author correctly asserts that the victim, long used as a witness and then ignored, is still poorly served despite major strides in Victim Rights legislation, restitution collection programs and victim advocate offices attached to police departments and prosecutors....
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Restorative justice and victims of terrorism
September 6, 2010
For victims who do not want to engage in a direct face-to-face meeting with the offender, indirect victim– offender mediation is a possible alternative to communicate through an intermediary with the offender. If the victim cannot meet the offender, because he is unknown or dead, victim...
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Truth and reconciliation at a price
September 6, 2010
Second, gacaca’s emphasis on popular participation during hearings has yielded significant dividends in terms of truth. In particular, gacaca has been important for recovering truth in the form of legal facts about the genocide and therapeutic truth in terms of allowing individuals to...
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Police-referred restorative justice for juveniles in Australia
September 6, 2010
A number of key points about the application of restorative justice measures to juveniles in Australia’s jurisdictions are highlighted, including that juveniles were referred to conferences primarily for property crimes and that Indigenous juveniles comprised higher proportions of those...
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Restorative justice is not just saying ‘Sorry’
September 6, 2010
The restorative process motivates many offenders better than a court order. This is part of the reason for the well attested drop in the frequency of re-offending. Johnson is right to say that many offenders need help. ‘Making things better’ includes not only...
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Towards a Restorative Society: a problem-solving response to harm
September 6, 2010
Martin Wright cogently claims that overcrowded prisons are not fit for purpose, and that it makes no sense to send people to prison. He proposes the idea for “transferable fundingâ€. In brief, when the probation service identifies particular needs and starts projects which reduce...
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News about abusive texts stuns parents of dead girl
August 31, 2010
After 13 months of questioning police, lawyers, courts and the coroner’s office, she heard for the first time yesterday from Judge James Weir that Tiumalu knew about the abusive texts. Tiumalu had told her during a restorative justice session that he had no idea, and he was going to...
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Nigerian lawyers insist on criminal justice reforms
August 31, 2010
While speaking with Daily Trust recently, Nwosu further advocated the use of Restorative Justice options such as plea bargaining, bail process and victim-offender mediation. He argued that this takes cognisance of the underlying issues involved in an offence which ranges from sociological,...
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Where do we draw the line?
August 25, 2010
Of course, I try to keep the conversation on track in relation to the offense. We talk about what happened, who was affected, how they were affected, etc. Yet, these other issues find their way into the conversation. Usually, child and parent start talking to each other. It’s like...
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Not Just an Apology
August 25, 2010
In illustrating his points, Johnson refers to the story of a fifteen year-old girl who came from a very bad family situation that included addictions and abuse. When she eventually became an offender by passing on the violence she had experienced to someone else, the teen was arrested and...
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Mandela’s children
August 24, 2010
When Coetzee is asked about the dreams he has for his future, he says he would like to get married. He says he will have to tell his future wife and any children he may have that he is a murderer. Now Harris Sibeko intervenes. “Listen here, chief, you must wait until a child is...
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Zimbabwe: Calls for restorative justice must be heeded now
August 22, 2010
But then some will argue that then this goes against the principles of restorative justice but conform to the dictates of vengeance instead, thus justice must be delivered in the here and now so that victims like the man cited above may know peace in their hearts. African politicians have...
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Meet the modern high schooler
August 22, 2010
“We heard a presentation on cyberbullying and heard stories about a kid who had committed suicide over bullying,” says Purdon. “I have never been bullied,” adds Roberge. ….”The boundaries are grey where bullying starts and stops,” says Brooks. “A...
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