social justice

In a letter to The Beachcomber, Rev. Dan Houston of the Vashon Presbyterian Church asks us Islanders to consider the issues of forgiveness and justice, having worked with his congregation through the pain of vandalism at the church.

In part, he wished to express solidarity with the Havurat Ee Shalom and the pain of violation resulting from the vandalism at their synagogue.

When crimes are committed, not only are there injured victims, but as we have learned from the string of crimes we’ve experienced on Vashon, there is a rending of the community as well. Trust is lost; anger turns into a thirst for vengeance, which is often mistakenly called justice.

The object of our “justice” system is not to heal the injured and make the community whole, but to assign blame, punish and isolate the offender. When an offender is convicted, our retributive system requires further injury — to the offender. The results of our system are shocking.

The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population but almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners. Americans are locked up for crimes — from writing bad checks to using drugs — that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries and Americans are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations.

According to The New York Times, the United States has 751 people in prison or jail for every 100,000 people. The only other major industrialized nation that even comes close is Russia, with 627 for every 100,000; England, 151; Germany, 88; and Japan, 63.

There are other ways of responding to crime that are successful in healing victims, offenders and communities — called “restorative justice.”

In this country, Mennonites promulgated victim/offender reconciliation programs, in which trained community volunteer mediators facilitate dialogue between participants who are willing to meet. Mediation sessions provide opportunity for offenders to learn the human consequences of their crimes and to apologize. Victims express their feelings about the crimes, get answers to questions such as “why me?” and, when satisfied, forgive. Between them, agreements are made and contracts written for how offenders can make up for their crimes. Many programs work closely with the courts that then approve the contracts as part of sentencing.

For example, several years ago a neighborhood was beset by car break-ins and vandalism. The slightest nighttime sound would waken families, sending them scurrying to their windows or doors to check their vehicles.

Tension and sleeplessness grew. Finally the police caught a young man in the act after an alert resident called 911. The car prowler was known in the community, but not for any earlier crimes.

As mediator, I asked him to participate in a meeting with the family whose car he had been caught breaking into. He agreed. The family also agreed to voluntarily meet.

In the mediation, the youth learned about the sleepless nights and tension family members and the larger community had been living with. He expressed remorse and apologized. We negotiated an agreement that he would canvas the entire neighborhood accompanied by his probation officer and apologize at each house for their pain and suffering — a tough, but reasonable consequence.

Lessons were learned and healing began. Many weeks later, he was reconciled with his neighbors.

There are even more sophisticated approaches than this. The government of the Yukon Territories has adopted a justice system based upon traditional Tlingit healing circles for all nonviolent crimes.

A trained facilitator meets separately with victims, offenders, their families and with any in the community who wish. Each is invited to a circle to speak about how the crime impacted them personally. Then the offender and family meet privately to talk about what the offender’s consequences should be, coming back to the whole group with a proposal.

The victims and community members must be satisfied by the solution and be willing to monitor it. Representatives from the legal system, also present, must be satisfied that the agreement reached is consistent with law.

Restorative justice has an entirely different goal than our retributive justice system. It is to restore, as much as possible, to wholeness; to encourage apology, to encourage, but not force, forgiveness and to make reconciliation possible.

In Judaism this is called Shalom. Christianity, Islam and other religions

also promote these principles. Restorative justice inserts between the crime and forgiveness the vital steps necessary to heal the victim, offender and community.

— Kate Hunter is a

former director, mediator and trainer with the King County Victim Offender Reconciliation Program.