Remember when you got into a fight with a brother or sister and your parents brought you together in a room and were told to explain yourself, apologize and patch up whatever effect you misdeed may have had?
In a nutshell, that's restorative justice.
So explained Morgan Jamieson, executive director of the Prince George Urban Aboriginal Justice Society (PGUAJS), when she spoke to about 20 people during the B.C. Crime Prevention Association's northern symposium on Saturday at the Ramada.
"Simply put, that is what it's about," Jamieson said. "Teaching people, encouraging people, supporting people that when they've done something harmful, to repair it and move on and it involves the offender as well as the victim."
Jamieson's job is to organize gatherings between the offender and the victim whenever a matter is referred to her by Crown counsel or the RCMP. PGUAJS has even taken on referrals from the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia.
Most of the offenders are age 12 to 19 although the PGUAJS is now working with adults and younger people.
The get-togethers usually take the form of a "healing circle," whose roots lie in the prairie native tradition. The circles consist of the offender, the victim, members of the Society and trained volunteers from the community.
The goal is to address "four R's:"
- recognition or who was affected;
- responsibility or at what point could the offender have made a different decision.
- repair or how can the damage from the offence be fixed?
- restoration or returning to the your position in the community.
With the exception of allegations of sexual abuse or physical abuse of children - which are automatically reported to authorities - everything that is spoken is kept confidential.
"Because of that, you're not going to get into any more trouble if you're going to tell the whole story or if you tell who was implicated or how many of your friends were also involved," Jamieson said.
PGUAJS operates on a budget of $228,000 a year which pays for three staff and office space. Jamieson said that's good value for money because the program has kept plenty of youth from continuing to down the wrong path while also easing pressure on the traditional justice system. Of the 500 offenders who've gone through the process and PGUAJS has continued to track over the 10 years the program has been running just 20 have reoffended.
She also had an answer for critics who say restorative justice is an "easy way out," namely that forcing youth to talk about their actions packs an emotional wallop they otherwise would not have to go through.
"If you want the easy way out, stand in a courtroom and let a lawyer say whether you're guilty or not guilty for you, and you don't have to explain to anybody what happened or why," Jamieson said. "In fact, the legal advice is to keep your mouth shut."
There are 30 such programs across the province, aimed primarily at aboriginal youth although some cases involving non-aboriginals are also taken on. There once was a restorative justice program in Prince George for youth in general but it's no longer running.
"I would like to see more restorative justice programs in the city," Jamieson said. "There is a huge need."
