Victim-Offender Dialogue

Articles on meetings of prisoners with their actual victims while they are in prison.

Criminals could cut sentences by saying ‘sorry’: from the article by Anushka Asthana and Jamie Doward in The Observer: Tens of thousands of offenders may be able to reduce their sentences by making personal apologies to their victims, under plans for a “rehabilitation revolution” in the criminal justice system. Crispin Blunt, the prisons minister, is considering the move as part of a drive to offer victims the chance to come face-to-face with the person who committed the crime against them. A report released today by two charities, Victim Support and the Restorative Justice Consortium, suggests the policy could save £185m in two years by cutting reoffending.
Healing in a hard place: from the article by Naseem Rakha in the Sunday Oregonian: How do people heal from violent crime? How do they mend after a rape or assault, or after losing a loved one to murder? How do they get over the grief, anger and gnawing sense that no matter what happens, justice will never be served? For Patricia Dahlgren, whose mother, June Duncan, was abducted and strangled in December 1995, the answer came from an unusual source: the man who killed her mother.
Va. OKs bill to let violent crime victims meet with death row inmates: from the Associated Press article in The Washington Post: Lorraine Whoberry tried for years to meet face-to-face with her daughter's killer before he was executed last month. She was repeatedly denied. So the day after she witnessed his execution, Whoberry sat down with Gov. Bob McDonnell and asked for his help. A bill was making its way through the Virginia General Assembly that would allow victims of violent crime to meet with the perpetrators, but it excluded those on death row and juveniles. McDonnell amended the bill to allow victims to meet with inmates on death row. On Wednesday, the General Assembly unanimously approved the change. Although more than half of the states have victim-offender mediation programs, advocates said Virginia would be one of the first to cement it in state law. Virginia also becomes one of only a handful that allow meetings with death row inmates. “Even though it's not going to affect us, at least we've got something done,” Whoberry said when told about the change.
Parole denied for repeat drink-driver who killed woman: from Radio New Zealand News: The Parole Board is encouraging the family of a woman killed by a repeat drink-driver to consider a restorative justice meeting with him. Jonathan Barclay is serving a prison term of five years and six months for the manslaughter of 20-year-old Debbie Ashton, whom he killed in a head-on car crash near Nelson.
What is justice? State program brings victims and offenders face to face: Martha Early, a middle-aged single mother, and Andrew Papke, the chaplain's assistant, sit silently across from each other in the chapel, their hands clasped tightly across a wooden table. To Early's right sits a stack of pictures of her daughter Beth, killed -- along with her boyfriend, Daniel London -- by a teenage drunken driver in 1996. In front of her sits a well-worn binder bursting with colorful stationery and letters full of memories of Beth; she brought them to share with Andrew. Next to the binder is her Bible. Early gazes at Papke with a look of calm sadness, while Papke's head hangs solemnly. Seconds turn into minutes, and neither one moves. It seems as if the slightest murmur would send them back to earth, where they will be forced to communicate with words. Finally, Early squeezes Papke's hand. "I love you, Andrew," she whispers. "I love you, too," he answers hoarsely. Within moments, Papke's arms -- the very same arms that steered a car headlong into Beth Early -- are encircling her mother. After engaging in a brief hug, Martha Early gets ready to begin her three-hour drive back to Austin. Andrew returns to his prison cell at the Walls Unit in Huntsville, where he is serving 40 years for intoxication manslaughter.
Muhammad and the 'closure' myth: from Naseem Rakha's column in the Washington Post: ....In the past decade, 24 U.S. prisons have begun victim-offender dialogue programs. These programs give victims' survivors opportunities to meet with, talk to and ask questions of the offenders, often questions only the offender can answer. According to John Wilson, director of Just Alternatives, a group that trains prison personnel in the dialogue program, this victim-led initiative has brought a sense of power and renewal to the lives of survivors. "Survivors can go through years of therapy, but until they have the opportunity to talk with their offenders, their healing often feels unfinished," he said.
Grieving mum’s prison visit inspired by daughter’s kindness: from Jon Livesey's article in the Lancashire Telegraph: A heartbroken mother drew on the memory of her daughter killed in a car crash to find the courage to meet the burglar who broke into her home. Margaret Foxley told the burglar the laptop he stole contained treasured photographs of her daughter Jessica, who died in a car crash with two friends in Colne six months later. It was the first time in Lancashire that a victim had gone into prison to meet the person who committed a crime against them as part of the ‘restorative justice’ programme.
Three-year research project on mediation and restorative justice in prison settings: from the flyer announcing the project: The Mediation and Restorative Justice in Prison Settings Project is a three year international exchange project funded by the European Commission, between the counties of Germany, Hungary and the UK. The project will identify, exchange and develop best practice for the use of restorative justice (“RJ”) with the most serious crimes, particularly those against persons and property attracting a custodial sentence. Research suggests that RJ can have the biggest impact on the lives of victims and offenders where such serious crimeshave been committed.
Workman, Kim. The Future of Restorative Justice – Control, Co-option, and Co-operation: This paper explores the history of restorative justice in New Zealand and lays out a course for the future.
Vos, Betty and Hansen, Toran and Umbreit, Mark S and Vos, Betty. Summary Report: Introduction of Restorative Justice in the Ukrainian Legal System.: Independent evaluators Betty Vos, Ph.D., Mark Umbreit, Ph.D., and Toran Hansen, M.S.W. from the Center for Restorative Justice & Peacemaking (CRJ&P), University of Minnesota, USA, conducted the evaluation between April, 2004 and February, 2006. In collaboration with the UCCG staff, the research team designed several data collection instruments that were filled out by UCCG programme staff and VOM participants. This data collection was coordinated by the UCCG Project Design, Monitoring and Evaluation Coordinator. In February, 2006, Betty Vos conducted a ten day site visit to Kyiv and three regions of Ukraine to complete the data collection. The primary objectives of the evaluation were: To study and evaluate the functioning opportunities of victim-offender mediation (VOM) in Ukraine; To study and evaluate the developed mechanisms of cooperation between mediation organizations and legal system offices; and To study and evaluate the consequences of VOM for its participants. (excerpt)
van Garse, Leo. Mediation in a Detention Context: Moralisation or Participation?: This article discusses the author’s development of mediation processes between victim and offenders in Belgium. The focus of the mediation is during the criminal justice process, particularly the punishment phase. In 2005, Belgium passed an act making mediation a part of the Code of Criminal Procedure, and mediation was introduced to address the problem of overpopulated prisons. One proposal was “restorative detention” where civil servants would work in prisons to counsel prison personnel on how to promote a restorative environment. The main goal is reinforcing prisoners to think about the harm they have caused and how they can mend that harm. The final section of the article discusses the author’s findings from employing mediation and restorative justice frameworks in Belgium prisons.
Doerfler, David. "Facing the pain that heals.": Doerfler points to the pain people feel as a result of violent crime. People deal with their pain in different ways. Some victims need and want considerable assistance to deal with it. The Victim Offender Mediation Dialogue (VOMD) program in Texas exists to help victims of crime face their pain and deal with it constructively, in part through dialogue with the offender who caused the pain. Doerfler sketches the trauma a victim may experience and the healing a victim may also experience. He also outlines how the VOMD program operates.
Immarigeon, Russ. Prison-Based Victim Offender Reconciliation Programs: Twenty years after the first victim-offender reconciliation meeting, victim-offender meetings are increasingly being held in prisons. This chapter describes victim-offender reconciliation programs at five sites in Canada, the U.K., and the U.S. These programs have slightly different objectives than community-based victim-offender mediation programs; they emphasize sharing information and healing rather than restitution. They differ from one another in several ways, including continuity, objectives, and origins. This chapter identifies operational issues and reviews relevant evaluation research. Several recommendations are made to support further prison use of victim-offender meetings.
Vazulla, Juan Carlos. The participation of the community representative in mediation involving youth perpetrators: In Brazil, the juvenile justice system includes victim-offender mediation. Now they have added a third mediator into those meetings: one that represents the community that was transgressed against.
Kearney, Niall. Issues of affecting victims of severe violence in the context of RJ in Scotland.: SACRO (Safeguarding Communities Reducing Offending) is the largest NGO (non governmental organisation) operating in the criminal justice sector in Scotland. SACRO has pioneered communication between those injured by crime and those responsible since the late ‘80s through its diversion from prosecution and Youth Justice services. Since 2002, a number of requests have been made to SACRO by Criminal Justice Social Work Departments and the Scottish Prison Service to facilitate communication within a post sentence context between those harmed by and those responsible for severe violent crime. SACRO has provided training from David Doerfler, an experienced Victim-Offender Mediator from Texas USA, to meet these requests. This has led to the development of a new SACRO initiative called TASC (Talk After Severe Crime), which operates to date on a limited spot purchase basis. In this new service the words ‘victim’ and ‘offender’ are replaced by: person injured and person responsible. The new service takes its language from the broader human sciences discourse in order to maximise the potential for increased understanding between all those affected. (excerpt)
Newell, Tim. Restorative Justice in Prisons: The Possibility of Change: Tim Newell served as a prison governor in England for over three decades. Retired from the Prison Service, he now works as a restorative justice facilitator. In this paper, he reports on a six month project he carried out as a Cropwood Fellow (a program of the Institute of Criminology at Cambridge University) on the potential of restorative practice in prisons. Specifically, through this project he examined the extent to which concepts of restorative justice, developed in community settings, can be applied in custodial settings. After defining restorative justice, he discusses some characteristics of correctional systems, the nature of his project and research method, and key results of his research.
Doerfler, David. Victim Offender Dialogue: Healing on a Deeper Level: Crime harms both the victim and the offender in many ways, including material and emotional forms. According to David Doerfler, long experienced in providing victim offender mediation programs and in training others for such programs, victim offender dialogue is a process that can enable victims and offenders to face that harm honestly and constructively, thus beginning or continuing a process of personal and relational healing. With this in mind, Doerfler explores certain aspects of victim offender dialogue, in particular the deep emotional needs of victims, and the role of the facilitator in relation to those needs.

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Navigation Prison Cell Overview Victim Awareness and Empathy Programmes Making Amends in Prison Victim-Offender Dialogue Conflict Resolution Transformation Programmes Preparation for Release Prison-Community Relations Examples Issues Prison Moratorium/Abolition Parole	Info Victim-Offender Dialogue Articles on meetings of prisoners with their actual victims while they are in prison. Criminals could cut sentences by saying ‘sorry’ from the article by Anushka Asthana and Jamie Doward in The Observer: Tens of thousands of offenders may be able to reduce their sentences by making personal apologies to their victims, under plans for a “rehabilitation revolution” in the criminal justice system. Crispin Blunt, the prisons minister, is considering the move as part of a drive to offer victims the chance to come face-to-face with the person who committed the crime against them. A report released today by two charities, Victim Support and the Restorative Justice Consortium, suggests the policy could save £185m in two years by cutting reoffending. Healing in a hard place from the article by Naseem Rakha in the Sunday Oregonian: How do people heal from violent crime? How do they mend after a rape or assault, or after losing a loved one to murder? How do they get over the grief, anger and gnawing sense that no matter what happens, justice will never be served? For Patricia Dahlgren, whose mother, June Duncan, was abducted and strangled in December 1995, the answer came from an unusual source: the man who killed her mother. Va. OKs bill to let violent crime victims meet with death row inmates from the Associated Press article in The Washington Post: Lorraine Whoberry tried for years to meet face-to-face with her daughter's killer before he was executed last month. She was repeatedly denied. So the day after she witnessed his execution, Whoberry sat down with Gov. Bob McDonnell and asked for his help. A bill was making its way through the Virginia General Assembly that would allow victims of violent crime to meet with the perpetrators, but it excluded those on death row and juveniles. McDonnell amended the bill to allow victims to meet with inmates on death row. On Wednesday, the General Assembly unanimously approved the change. Although more than half of the states have victim-offender mediation programs, advocates said Virginia would be one of the first to cement it in state law. Virginia also becomes one of only a handful that allow meetings with death row inmates. “Even though it's not going to affect us, at least we've got something done,” Whoberry said when told about the change. Parole denied for repeat drink-driver who killed woman from Radio New Zealand News: The Parole Board is encouraging the family of a woman killed by a repeat drink-driver to consider a restorative justice meeting with him. Jonathan Barclay is serving a prison term of five years and six months for the manslaughter of 20-year-old Debbie Ashton, whom he killed in a head-on car crash near Nelson. What is justice? State program brings victims and offenders face to face Martha Early, a middle-aged single mother, and Andrew Papke, the chaplain's assistant, sit silently across from each other in the chapel, their hands clasped tightly across a wooden table. To Early's right sits a stack of pictures of her daughter Beth, killed -- along with her boyfriend, Daniel London -- by a teenage drunken driver in 1996. In front of her sits a well-worn binder bursting with colorful stationery and letters full of memories of Beth; she brought them to share with Andrew. Next to the binder is her Bible. Early gazes at Papke with a look of calm sadness, while Papke's head hangs solemnly. Seconds turn into minutes, and neither one moves. It seems as if the slightest murmur would send them back to earth, where they will be forced to communicate with words. Finally, Early squeezes Papke's hand. "I love you, Andrew," she whispers. "I love you, too," he answers hoarsely. Within moments, Papke's arms -- the very same arms that steered a car headlong into Beth Early -- are encircling her mother. After engaging in a brief hug, Martha Early gets ready to begin her three-hour drive back to Austin. Andrew returns to his prison cell at the Walls Unit in Huntsville, where he is serving 40 years for intoxication manslaughter. Muhammad and the 'closure' myth from Naseem Rakha's column in the Washington Post: ....In the past decade, 24 U.S. prisons have begun victim-offender dialogue programs. These programs give victims' survivors opportunities to meet with, talk to and ask questions of the offenders, often questions only the offender can answer. According to John Wilson, director of Just Alternatives, a group that trains prison personnel in the dialogue program, this victim-led initiative has brought a sense of power and renewal to the lives of survivors. "Survivors can go through years of therapy, but until they have the opportunity to talk with their offenders, their healing often feels unfinished," he said. Grieving mum’s prison visit inspired by daughter’s kindness from Jon Livesey's article in the Lancashire Telegraph: A heartbroken mother drew on the memory of her daughter killed in a car crash to find the courage to meet the burglar who broke into her home. Margaret Foxley told the burglar the laptop he stole contained treasured photographs of her daughter Jessica, who died in a car crash with two friends in Colne six months later. It was the first time in Lancashire that a victim had gone into prison to meet the person who committed a crime against them as part of the ‘restorative justice’ programme. Three-year research project on mediation and restorative justice in prison settings from the flyer announcing the project: The Mediation and Restorative Justice in Prison Settings Project is a three year international exchange project funded by the European Commission, between the counties of Germany, Hungary and the UK. The project will identify, exchange and develop best practice for the use of restorative justice (“RJ”) with the most serious crimes, particularly those against persons and property attracting a custodial sentence. Research suggests that RJ can have the biggest impact on the lives of victims and offenders where such serious crimeshave been committed. Workman, Kim. The Future of Restorative Justice – Control, Co-option, and Co-operation This paper explores the history of restorative justice in New Zealand and lays out a course for the future. Vos, Betty and Hansen, Toran and Umbreit, Mark S and Vos, Betty. Summary Report: Introduction of Restorative Justice in the Ukrainian Legal System. Independent evaluators Betty Vos, Ph.D., Mark Umbreit, Ph.D., and Toran Hansen, M.S.W. from the Center for Restorative Justice & Peacemaking (CRJ&P), University of Minnesota, USA, conducted the evaluation between April, 2004 and February, 2006. In collaboration with the UCCG staff, the research team designed several data collection instruments that were filled out by UCCG programme staff and VOM participants. This data collection was coordinated by the UCCG Project Design, Monitoring and Evaluation Coordinator. In February, 2006, Betty Vos conducted a ten day site visit to Kyiv and three regions of Ukraine to complete the data collection. The primary objectives of the evaluation were: To study and evaluate the functioning opportunities of victim-offender mediation (VOM) in Ukraine; To study and evaluate the developed mechanisms of cooperation between mediation organizations and legal system offices; and To study and evaluate the consequences of VOM for its participants. (excerpt) van Garse, Leo. Mediation in a Detention Context: Moralisation or Participation? This article discusses the author’s development of mediation processes between victim and offenders in Belgium. The focus of the mediation is during the criminal justice process, particularly the punishment phase. In 2005, Belgium passed an act making mediation a part of the Code of Criminal Procedure, and mediation was introduced to address the problem of overpopulated prisons. One proposal was “restorative detention” where civil servants would work in prisons to counsel prison personnel on how to promote a restorative environment. The main goal is reinforcing prisoners to think about the harm they have caused and how they can mend that harm. The final section of the article discusses the author’s findings from employing mediation and restorative justice frameworks in Belgium prisons. Doerfler, David. "Facing the pain that heals." Doerfler points to the pain people feel as a result of violent crime. People deal with their pain in different ways. Some victims need and want considerable assistance to deal with it. The Victim Offender Mediation Dialogue (VOMD) program in Texas exists to help victims of crime face their pain and deal with it constructively, in part through dialogue with the offender who caused the pain. Doerfler sketches the trauma a victim may experience and the healing a victim may also experience. He also outlines how the VOMD program operates. Immarigeon, Russ. Prison-Based Victim Offender Reconciliation Programs Twenty years after the first victim-offender reconciliation meeting, victim-offender meetings are increasingly being held in prisons. This chapter describes victim-offender reconciliation programs at five sites in Canada, the U.K., and the U.S. These programs have slightly different objectives than community-based victim-offender mediation programs; they emphasize sharing information and healing rather than restitution. They differ from one another in several ways, including continuity, objectives, and origins. This chapter identifies operational issues and reviews relevant evaluation research. Several recommendations are made to support further prison use of victim-offender meetings. Vazulla, Juan Carlos. The participation of the community representative in mediation involving youth perpetrators In Brazil, the juvenile justice system includes victim-offender mediation. Now they have added a third mediator into those meetings: one that represents the community that was transgressed against. Kearney, Niall. Issues of affecting victims of severe violence in the context of RJ in Scotland. SACRO (Safeguarding Communities Reducing Offending) is the largest NGO (non governmental organisation) operating in the criminal justice sector in Scotland. SACRO has pioneered communication between those injured by crime and those responsible since the late ‘80s through its diversion from prosecution and Youth Justice services. Since 2002, a number of requests have been made to SACRO by Criminal Justice Social Work Departments and the Scottish Prison Service to facilitate communication within a post sentence context between those harmed by and those responsible for severe violent crime. SACRO has provided training from David Doerfler, an experienced Victim-Offender Mediator from Texas USA, to meet these requests. This has led to the development of a new SACRO initiative called TASC (Talk After Severe Crime), which operates to date on a limited spot purchase basis. In this new service the words ‘victim’ and ‘offender’ are replaced by: person injured and person responsible. The new service takes its language from the broader human sciences discourse in order to maximise the potential for increased understanding between all those affected. (excerpt) Newell, Tim. Restorative Justice in Prisons: The Possibility of Change Tim Newell served as a prison governor in England for over three decades. Retired from the Prison Service, he now works as a restorative justice facilitator. In this paper, he reports on a six month project he carried out as a Cropwood Fellow (a program of the Institute of Criminology at Cambridge University) on the potential of restorative practice in prisons. Specifically, through this project he examined the extent to which concepts of restorative justice, developed in community settings, can be applied in custodial settings. After defining restorative justice, he discusses some characteristics of correctional systems, the nature of his project and research method, and key results of his research. Doerfler, David. Victim Offender Dialogue: Healing on a Deeper Level Crime harms both the victim and the offender in many ways, including material and emotional forms. According to David Doerfler, long experienced in providing victim offender mediation programs and in training others for such programs, victim offender dialogue is a process that can enable victims and offenders to face that harm honestly and constructively, thus beginning or continuing a process of personal and relational healing. With this in mind, Doerfler explores certain aspects of victim offender dialogue, in particular the deep emotional needs of victims, and the role of the facilitator in relation to those needs. Document Actions RSS feed Send this Print this	Africa Asia Europe Latin America Middle East North America and Caribbean Pacific Search 9932 publications on restorative justice Recent RJOB Comments Oakland as a RJ city? Jul 29, 2010 Trauma Jul 29, 2010 Psych Reports to BPT board Jul 29, 2010 More… Slide Show: What is Restorative Justice Click to view a slideshow discussing the definition of restorative justice. Jul 21, 2010 Promoting Restorative Justice in Panama Jul 28, 2010 Raising Community Awareness in Swaziland Jul 28, 2010 Exploring alternatives in Finland Jul 28, 2010 PF Rwanda Receives Grant for Reconciliation Work Jun 27, 2010 Restorative Justice in the Community.