Restorative Justice

The Obsolescence Of War

July 7, 2024 Nadia Mejjati, Waging Nonviolence. Strategize! Non-Violence, Restorative Justice, Unarmed civilian protection, Wars and Militarism

The proponents of war say that violence is necessary for “defense.” But is that true? Humanity has learned how to wipe itself out in a matter of minutes with just a fraction of its nuclear weapons capability. Our atrocious culture of violence shows thousands of children killed in cold blood like a relentless horror film playing out on social media. We have invented killer-drones to undertake massacres without personally witnessing the horrors inflicted. In the face of our threatened extinction as a species, we must do better. That starts with seeing war for what it is. War is grotesque. It represents the worst of humanity: the cruelty of unharnessed anger and unhealed trauma, led by greedy leaders far from the frontlines, playing with human lives.

I Was Every Woman’s Worst Nightmare; Restorative Justice Changed Me

April 28, 2023 Aaron Edward Olson, Waging Nonviolence. Create! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Health Care, Human Rights, Restorative Justice

Tears poured down my cheeks. Hunched over on a hard plastic chair, elbows on knees, I buried my face in my hands. The group was silent. I had just shared the details of my crimes. Robbery and sexual assault. I confessed to being every woman’s worst nightmare. Recounting these moments from years ago brought a resurgence of guilt and shame. I had been a young, strung-out, ruthless gang member, with zero respect for women, and I had an accomplice to impress. The host of our group embraced me with a hug, her gentle hand rubbing my back. “I’m proud of you,” she whispered in my ear, validating my emotions, and washing away years of crippling embarrassment. She was a sexual assault survivor.

Jen Angel Wouldn’t Want Her Death To Be Used to Incarcerate Anyone

March 9, 2023 Brooke Anderson, In These Times. Educate! Activism, Oakland, Prison abolition, Restorative Justice

Jen Angel, an activist, journalist and baker who was fatally injured during a robbery outside of a bank in Oakland, Calif., in early February, believed in building a society without police and prisons, and she would not have wanted her assailants incarcerated. Doing so would only distort her memory and what she stood for, and many of those who were close to her have come together since she died to try and protect that legacy. Angel, 48, died February 9, three days after she was dragged 50 feet by her assailants’ getaway car, her head hitting the pavement. She spent several days in intensive care before being removed from life support.

At San Quentin Prison, Law Students See Restorative Justice In Action

January 30, 2023 Juan Moreno Haines, Next City. Create! California, Criminal Justice and Prisons, Legal System, Restorative Justice

After serving 36 years and seven months, Tommy “Shakur” Ross counted down the last four days of serving a life sentence with the possibility of parole at San Quentin State Prison. Months earlier, the parole board had already approved his release. Nevertheless, last April, he volunteered to play a part in a restorative justice class. As eight law students and eight other incarcerated restorative justice facilitators listened, he sat in a circle with them to discuss the 1985 murder conviction that had led him to prison. “Talk to somebody,” Ross told the students. “Tell somebody the truth. You can’t keep it all inside.” Because it was participating in restorative justice programs at San Quentin, he says, that helped him find a sense of redemption. And on this day, through their impact statements and a number of exercises, Ross and his co-facilitators were helping the law students reconsider what accountability and the criminal justice system could look like.

The City That Kicked Cops Out Of Schools

December 13, 2022 Andy Kopsa, In These Times. Create! Education, Iowa, Police in Schools, Restorative Justice

Des Moines, Iowa - Wearing bright yellow Crocs, carrying a backpack and holding a clipboard stacked with papers, Ahmed Musa listens intently to a student. You would be forgiven for thinking Mr. Musa was a student himself; it is “staff dress like a student” day during spirit week at Theodore Roosevelt High School, and Mr. Musa looks the part. Then again, Mr. Musa, 24, was a Roosevelt student not too long ago. He graduated in 2017. He is talking with senior Jackie in a second floor hallway. She is animated, her purple and white braids falling across her baby blue N95 mask as she explains a problem. She is the president of the K-Club and there was an incident among members.

Black-Led Resistance Movements Are Paving The Way For Reparations

September 4, 2020 Sarah Freeman-Woolpert, Waging Nonviolence. Create! Economic Justice, Reparations, Restorative Justice, Systemic Racism

Months after the police killing of George Floyd sparked racial justice protests around the world, Black Lives Matter activists are once again flooding the streets — this time in response to the recent police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Among the demands that continue to ring out is the call for reparations, or payment to people of African descent. Several African countries — including Namibia, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo — have also joined the call, demanding reparations from European countries for the perpetration of genocide under colonialism.

Amid Calls To Defund Police, Detroit Leaders Weigh In On Alternatives

July 14, 2020 DeJanay Booth, Model D Media. Create! Defund the police, Detroit, Police violence, Restorative Justice

In the wake of Floyd’s death, protests have mobilized in several states, and locally in Detroit, where protesters have marched regularly since late May. While most protests have mostly been peaceful, there have been instances of violence, including during the early days of the protests when demonstrators were met with tear gas, shields, and handcuffs, with scores arrested after being out past curfew and reports of some protesters hurling objects at police; a police car driving through a crowd of protesters; and the fatal shooting of Hakim Littleton by police near Six Mile and San Juan. Police footage shows Littleton being shot after firing at officers who were arresting a man on a separate matter, sparking a protest that resulted in eight arrests.

What’s The Alternative To Police In Schools?

June 25, 2020 Curtis Black, Chicago Reporter. Create! Chicago, Conflict Resolution, Police in Schools, Restorative Justice

Thousands of Chicagoans have rallied in the past couple weeks behind the demand that Chicago Public Schools end its relationship with the police department. But a small group of advocates have been working on this issue for years, and they’ve won significant progress in recent months. We don’t know the impact of those changes yet — though we do know that alternatives to police in schools need much greater support. A new Chicago Police Department policy implemented last August removed so-called school resource officers from involvement in day-to-day disciplinary matters. It requires screening of potential officers, including consideration of their disciplinary records and involvement with youth, and selection in consultation with school principals. It mandates training in youth development, de-escalation, restorative justice, crisis intervention and disability issues.

Alleged Vandals Meet With Douglass Statue Creators Through ‘Restorative Justice’ Program

March 25, 2019 By Tanner Jubenville, 13wham.com Create! Frederick Douglas, Monuments, Restorative Justice

Rochester, N.Y. (13WHAM) - There was outcry in the community after a Frederick Douglass statue at the corner of Tracey and Alexander Streets was vandalized in December. But those behind the project still called for the incident to be a teaching moment, saying it's what Douglass would've wanted. Charles Milks and John Boedicker are charged with criminal mischief in the crime. At the time, they were students at St. John Fisher College. The college said Thursday they are no longer enrolled. The statue was part of a series commemorating the 200th birthday of Frederick Douglass, a project run by the Re-energizing the Legacy of Frederick Douglass Committee.

Suspensions Are Down, But Restorative Discipline Not Up

December 16, 2017 Staff, badassteachers.blogspot.com Create! Education, Restorative Justice, Schools

The racism, once long latent in “zero tolerance” school discipline policies, is now manifest to many education stake holders, especially in urban school districts with majority non-white students. White educators everywhere are waking up to the reality that America’s addiction to incarceration is directly tied to school discipline policies that disproportionately push students of color out of the classroom and into the juvenile justice system. In effort to reverse what is called the “school-to-prison pipeline,” many race conscious administrators have called for dramatic reductions in the number of out-of-school suspensions across all student racial demographics.

Trial By Peace Circle: How Chicago Community Is Pursuing Jail-Free Justice

December 1, 2017 Sarah Conway, inthesetimes.com Create! Chicago, Restorative Justice

By Sarah Conway for In These Times - CHICAGO—It’s 9:30 a.m. on a Thursday in late September and four young men in their early 20s sit bundled in gray and black hoodies in the gallery waiting room of a makeshift courthouse in North Lawndale, killing time on their phones. All are charged with nonviolent drug possession, and all are taking a chance on a new restorative justice court that promises a chance to wipe their records clean if they can make amends to their communities. The court opened August 31 and these four are among the first group of 12 defendants, all West Side men ages 18 to 26 charged with low-level nonviolent misdemeanors and felonies. At least we’re not at “26th and California,” says 22-year-old Tobias Pierce (all defendant names in this story are pseudonymous, at their request), referring to Chicago’s notorious Cook County Jail, where he was held for two years while on trial for armed robbery. “If [the guards] feel like you disrespecting them, they feel like they can harm you,” he says. “You down in the basement and ain’t no cameras down there.” Although Pierce was found not guilty, he says those two years set him back. “There was no job waiting for me ’cause I had been in jail for the past two years. Y’all had wasted two years of my time.” The restorative justice court does not hold defendants in jail and may remove their electronic monitoring. If Pierce repairs the harm he did to his neighborhood, he can have his case closed and a clean record in six months to a year. Despite the small talk, Jefferson Holt, 25, is still feeling nervous. Tall and thin, he rocks back and forth. He came to the court because he is “tired of running from the police” and hopes to get his record expunged. With a record, finding a job hasn’t been easy. He estimates he has applied to around 70 in five months and just landed one.

UN Experts Catalog Endless List Of Racial Discrimination In US

February 1, 2016 Andrea Germanos, www.commondreams.org Educate! Racial Discrimination, Reparations, Restorative Justice, United States

By Andrea Germanos for Common Dreams - From being victims of police killings to facing barriers to educational and health equity, African Americans are facing "systemic racial discrimination" and deserve reparatory justice, a United Nations working group said Friday. Having just completed an 11-day mission with visits to Washington D.C., Baltimore, Jackson, Miss., Chicago and New York City, the five-member Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent say they are "extremely concerned about the human rights situation of African Americans."

Deep Institutional Racism Calls For Restorative Response

December 14, 2014 Matthew Johnson, www.writingonthewall275.wordpress.com Create! police brutality, Racism, Restorative Justice

The question that remains, though, is what to do when there is another instance of police brutality that threatens to tear apart yet another community -- or even the whole country? I am so bold as to offer dialogue as the solution, which I know will disappoint both the revolutionaries and reactionaries alike. It does not require teargas, armored personnel carriers, or military-style assault weapons -- nor does it require the blocking of traffic, the destruction of property, or the looting of businesses. It proved to be transformative for the police and concerned citizens of Seattle when John T. Williams, a First Nations woodcarver, was needlessly shot down in 2010. While, as is almost always the case, the officer was not convicted for the killing, the restorative justice process used allowed for healing, understanding, and other forms of accountability that benefited not only those close to the matter but also the community as a whole.

A New Approach To Ending A Civil War

August 28, 2014 Constanza Vieira, www.ipsnews.net Educate! Civil War, Columbia, Peace, Restorative Justice, Violence

Three major advances were made over the last week in the peace talks that have been moving forward in Cuba for nearly two years between the Colombian government and the FARC guerrillas, while the decades-old civil war rages on. On Saturday Aug. 16, a group of relatives of victims of both sides met face-to-face in the Cuban capital. It was the first time in the world that victims have sat down at the same table with representatives of their victimisers in negotiations to put an end to a civil war. And on Thursday Aug. 21 an academic commission was set up to study the roots of the conflict and the factors that have stood in the way of bringing it to an end. That day, the unthinkable happened. High-level army, air force, navy and police officers flew to Cuba, under the command of General Javier Alberto Flórez, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In the 24-hour technical mission they met with their archenemies, the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which emerged in 1964) to discuss “how to implement a definitive bilateral ceasefire, and how the FARC would disband and lay down their arms,” said President Juan Manuel Santos.

New York City Preparing To Expand Restorative Justice Programs

June 25, 2014 Jackie Schechter, www.ny.chalkbeat.org Create! Criminal Justice and Prisons, Education, New York City (NYC), Restorative Justice

The city is poised to dramatically expand restorative justice programs aimed at improving school climate and rethinking school discipline next year. The head of the Department of Education’s Office of Safety and Youth Development verbally committed to provide new support for restorative justice programs at a May meeting about school discipline issues, according to two attendees. Though few details of the expansion have been finalized, the agreement represents the administration’s first step toward enacting discipline policy changes that Chancellor Carmen Fariña and Mayor Bill de Blasio have both called for. On Friday, a department spokeswoman said officials had been consulting with a number of organizations focused on school discipline, including Dignity in Schools. The New York chapter has been meeting monthly with the safety office to create a plan that would begin in January 2015, according to Elana Eisen-Markowitz, a teacher at the Urban Assembly Bronx Academy of Letters who attended the May meeting.

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