Retributive Justice And Restorative Justice

349-364. West Sussex, John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This chapter focuses on the Wolvercote Clinic, a positive treatment facility for high risk sex offenders to gain skills to assist them in their rehabilitation process and prepare them for life in the community. The authors acknowledge that it is essential for offenders to be taught skills in recognising and dealing with emotional and physical risk factors, managing feelings, developing social and positive thinking skills as well as sexual fantasy management. The authors argue that without the teaching of these skills in the facility, sexual offenders will find it challenging to reintegrate into the community which could lead to offence relapse.

Restorative justice includes things such as victim- offender mediation, victim- offender panels or community sentencing. However, this movement needs support from the local community and it is important that the restitution helps the victim recover from the trauma the crime might have caused. Further restorative justice can not be applied to some crimes, such as rape (Allen, et al., 2015). Currently restorative justice is mostly used within the juvenile justice system, mostly due to the believe that juveniles have to be treated differently than adults when it comes to punishment for an offence. Restorative justice is often prefered to the traditional system, since the offenders are more likely to comply with the required restitutions and it helps incorporate them back into their communities (Hines, 2008).

As the purpose of restorative justice is to mend the very relationship between the victim, offender, and society, communities that embrace restorative justice foster an awareness on how the act has harmed others. Braithwaite (1989) notes that by rejecting only the criminal act and not the offender, restorative justice allows for a closer empathetic relationship between the offender, victims, and community. By acknowledging the intrinsic worth of the offender and their ability to contribute back to the community, restorative justice shows how all individuals are capable of being useful despite criminal acts previous. This encourages offenders to safely reintegrate into society, as they are encouraged to rejoin and find rapport with the community through their emotions and

What victims want from the criminal justice system is a less formal process, more information about case processing, respectful treatment, and emotional restoration. Therefore, there is a growing need to progress towards the restorative justice (RJ) system. According to RJ perspective, a crime is considered a conflict between individuals that result in harm to victims, communities, and offenders, and so these parties are also involved in responding to it. One of the prevalent programs of the RJ system is victim-offender mediation (VOM) program. VOM program is a process which provides interested victims an opportunity to meet the offender, in a safe and structured setting, with the goal of holding the offender directly accountable for their behaviour while providing assistance and compensation to the victims; mediators do not impose settlements.

When a victim has gone through a traumatic event he or she can struggle with the process of restorative justice. The victim may still be dealing with frightening memories of the abuse. Also a victim may have come to terms with the domestic violence and would just like to leave it in the past. These are some of the unique challenges faced by

Jaquisha Magruder Professor Soni PSC 430 Final Restorative justice takes an approach that focuses on the community as a whole. The victims, the offenders, and the community are all included in this approach towards justice. This approach allows the victims to take an active role, but it strongly pushes for offenders to take responsibility for their wrong doings. In doing this, the offender is repairing the damage they have done. They do so by giving back stolen money or possessions, apologizing, and doing work in the community.

He perceives crime as a “wound in human relationship” and an action that “creates an obligation to restore and repair it.” To make his understanding clear, Zehr contrasts his understanding of Restorative Justice with retributive justice and argues that retributive justice understands ‘crime’ as a “violation of the state, defined by lawbreaking and guilt, justice determines blame and administers pain in a context between the offender and the state directed by systematic rules” but restorative justice see things differently as “crime is fundamentally a violation of people and interpersonal

Now that the two values and principles are stated, Karp (2004) definition of restorative justice as a collaborative decision making process that includes victims and offenders is understood a little more. In the case of Thordis and Tom was there evidence of the principals and values stated? Tom first started the repair process to the harm he caused Thordis by taking an active responsibility or acknowledging that he did indeed rape her. Unknown to him at the time, Tom would help mutually construct Thordis and his solidarity by their willingness to participate in the reconciliation. Karp & Sacks (2014) stated that restorative justice focuses on creating a trustworthy social support system in order to stimulate meaning dialogue and investment in the restorative process.

Healing is crucial not just for victims, but also for offenders. It challenges us to examine the root causes of violence and crime in order that these cycles might be broken. Restorative justice does not assume that the victim will or even should forgive the offender. Both the rehabilitation of offenders and their integration into the community are vital aspects of restorative justice. Many victims say that they often become most angry with the criminal justice

Introduction Agreeing on a definition of restorative justice has proved difficult. One definition is a theory of justice that focuses mostly on repairing the harm caused by criminal behaviour. The reparation is done through a cooperative process that includes all the stakeholders. Restorative justice can also be explained as an approach of justice that aims to satisfy the needs of the victims and offenders, as well as the entire community. The most broadly accepted definition for restorative justice, however, is a process whereby all the parties that have a stake in a specific offence collectively resolve on how to deal with the aftermath.