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 77

JRC: London Crown Court burglary 56

London Crown Court street crime 55

Northumbria adult court cases 51

Northumbria youth final warning cases 75

Thames Valley prison cases 36

REMEDI: adult offender-initiated 38

youth YOT referrals 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.7

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 9

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 Money saved through

over running period (£) decreases in offending (£)

JRC London 598,848 8,261,028

JRC Northumbria 275,411 320,125

JRC Thames Valley 222,463 461,455

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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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