Transcript Evaluation of STL Pilots in the Youth Court

Restorative justice and prisons
Presentation to the Commission on English Prisons Today, London,
7 November 2008
Joanna Shapland
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Restorative practices in the prison setting have included:
• restorative justice: victim-offender mediation and conferencing
between offenders and their victims - pre-sentence, during
sentences (victim-requested) and pre-release
• restorative justice: to resolve disputes between inmates and
between inmates and staff
• restorative practices and offender behaviour programmes such
as victim impact programmes
• restorative work for local communities.
I am concentrating on restorative justice, using Marshall’s (1999)
definition:
‘Restorative justice is a process whereby parties with a stake in a
specific offence collectively resolve how to deal with the
aftermath of the offence and its implications for the future’
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Most restorative justice projects internationally:
• have involved young offenders and minor offences
• mostly as diversion from criminal justice, or, sometimes, within
criminal justice
Our evaluation of three restorative justice schemes primarily
involved:
• adult offenders and often serious offences
• restorative justice within criminal justice - people experienced
both - at a variety of different stages of the criminal justice
process.
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There were two major aims for the schemes and the
evaluation:
• whether restorative justice reduced reoffending (and whether it
was value for money)
• to focus on the needs and rights of victims
For that, it was important that people wanted to participate in restorative
justice and that restorative justice was delivered well and consistently
over the several years the schemes were running (2001-2004).
All was after the offender had admitted guilt (guilty plea) and so prior to or
after sentencing. Restorative justice does not take the place of a trial.
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The schemes we evaluated
(all offences with personal victims; 840 restorative justice events; observed 285 conferences,
interviews with 180 offenders and 259 victims experiencing restorative justice):
•
Justice Research Consortium (JRC):
– conferencing with random assignment
– pre-sentence in London Crown Courts for adults, led by police facilitators
– pre-sentence for adults, final warnings for youths, some adult caution cases in
Northumbria, led by police facilitators
– community sentences and prison pre-release in Thames Valley (all adults), led by
probation officer, prison officer or community mediation facilitators
•
CONNECT:
– victim-offender indirect and direct mediation and conferencing (matched control
groups)
– pre-sentence, or during sentence, for adults
– mostly in two magistrates’ court areas in London
•
REMEDI:
– victim-offender mediation throughout S Yorkshire (matched control groups)
– community sentences and prison for adults
– youth justice and diversion for young offenders
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•
Conferencing (JRC) includes the offender, the victim, the offender’s
supporters and the victim’s supporters, together with a facilitator, but
not normally professionals - NOT the same as family group
conferencing
– The offender will explain how the offence happened
– The victim will say the effects of the offence on them, as will the victim’s
supporters and the offender’s supporters
– The conference will then turn to what could be done in the future to improve
things
•
•
Direct mediation is just the offender and the victim with a facilitator
Indirect mediation (shuttle mediation) is where the facilitator
passes information between the offender and victim, but there
is no meeting.
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The process
People did want to participate:
% victims who were approached
wishing to participate
CONNECT: adult magistrates' court
JRC: London Crown Court burglary
London Crown Court street crime
Northumbria adult court cases
Northumbria youth final warning cases
Thames Valley prison cases
REMEDI: adult offender-initiated
youth YOT referrals
77
56
55
51
75
36
38
83
Restorative justice was delivered consistently by well trained facilitators/mediators
Outcome agreements were made in over 98% of JRC conferences.
Noone assaulted anyone else in the schemes we evaluated - though there was
sometimes emotion.
People said they felt safe and could express what they wanted to say.
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Reoffending
•
A significant decrease in the frequency of reconviction over the
following two years, looking over all the trials, schemes and groups.
Offenders’ reoffending decelerated.
•
Looking at the likelihood of reconviction over the following two years,
overall results tended towards the positive direction, but were not
statistically significant.
•
Cost of convictions (cost to potential future victims plus costs of
criminal justice) combines frequency and severity. All JRC groups,
summed together, showed a significantly lower cost of convictions
versus the control groups.
•
No significant results pointing towards any criminogenic effects.
Restorative justice does not make people worse.
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Victim and offender views 1
•
These victims and offenders took part in restorative justice as well as
criminal justice. They were positive about criminal justice, but even
more positive about restorative justice.
•
The overall tone was one of satisfaction: 74% of JRC offenders and
78% of JRC victims would definitely/probably recommend
restorative justice to others
•
80% of JRC offenders and 85% of JRC victims were very/quite
satisfied with the conference - only 10% of JRC offenders and 12%
of JRC victims expressed any doubt about the outcome agreement
•
Not everyone was entirely satisfied, but only 6 offenders (of 152)
and 6 victims (of 216) were dissatisfied overall with JRC
conferencing - dissatisfaction revolved around disputes
about the offence or difficulties in communication
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Victim and offender views 2
•
What did participants want of rj? Victims wanted to find out how the
offence occurred and work to prevent reoffending. Offenders wanted to
apologise and explain - and prevent what might lead them to offend
again.
•
Conferences provided a sense of closure and, for many victims,
lessened the negative effects of the offence. Victims of serious
offences were particularly positive.
•
Victims who experienced rj were significantly more positive about
criminal justice.
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Why are the views of victims and offenders so positive in relation to these
restorative justice schemes?
Restorative justice seemed to be providing, for victims and
offenders:
– communication
• about what had happened
• about effects of the offence
– in conferences, addressing offending-related problems and
behaviour - problem-solving for the future. Both victims and
offenders wanted to do this.
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Value for money
•
Victims’ positive views about restorative justice can’t currently be
expressed financially - we don’t have financial measures for increased
well-being for victims
•
If rj is run in parallel with and in addition to criminal justice, it will
necessarily incur extra costs - the cost of running restorative justice
•
These costs may be mitigated over time by preventing further offending decreases in reoffending.
•
In our evaluation, for JRC conferencing - but not for mediation, these
decreases were sufficient to make conferencing value for money against
the cost of the scheme:
Cost for rj cases
over running period (£)
JRC London
JRC Northumbria
JRC Thames Valley
598,848
275,411
222,463
Money saved through
decreases in offending (£)
8,261,028
320,125
461,455
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So, what might be the role of restorative
justice in relation to prisons?
•
•
•
definitely a role during prison sentences where victims request this - we
currently do not have, nation-wide, a trained service to offer this for
victims
from our results and from the very positive results of the evaluation of
statutory youth conferencing in Northern Ireland, we would argue that
there is more than sufficient evidence to introduce statutory restorative
justice pre-sentence for adult offenders (maybe starting at the Crown
Court). This must be voluntary for both victims and offenders
Tony Bottoms’ and my longitudinal desistance study with persistent
offenders in their 20s, together with the JRC results, suggest that there
is a major role for restorative justice conferencing for adult prisoners
pre-release - to promote desistance (reducing/stopping offending)
I would argue that the current criminal justice system for adults is
impoverished in terms of not providing enough opportunities to help
offenders to desist - so conferencing may provide a ‘boost’ to offenders
deciding to start changing their lives, through supporting that decision
and mobilising potential resources to address offending-related
behaviour
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