Neighbourhood Disputes

Restorative processes provide an opportunity for neighbours to develop their own solutions to their conflicts while building more understanding and stronger relationships.

Community court set to go on trial

from the article in the Manchester Evening News: A project where ‘community courts’ decide how to punish criminals is to be trialled in Stockport. ….Low-level criminals and their victims will be brought together in front of a special panel, which will decide what community punishment to dish out. ….Rebecca Green, from ROC, said: “We looked at Brinnington as we are already established in the community with the cafe and there needs to be trust there. “The area can be highlighted as having problems so this scheme will have a good impact there.

Could restorative justice bring education antagonists together?

from the article by Pat Schneider in the Capital Times: It’s a painful irony for Ananda Mirilli that the School Board run she tried to use to call the community to come together to do better for Madison kids ended up embroiled in such controversy. ….Mirilli, a Latina who lost her bid for Seat 5 on the Madison School Board in the Feb. 18 primary, decided against a write-in campaign when primary winner Sarah Manski dropped out of the race just two days later. But Mirilli hasn’t given up hope that the election — despite Manski’s surprise withdrawal and the allegations of dirty politics and hypocrisy it incited — can yet be made an occasion to bring together people now sometimes working at odds to improve education in Madison schools. And as the Restorative Justice Program manager at YWCA Madison, Mirilli is wondering if restorative justice principles might be the way to do it.

mariannesong on Retaking our streets: Restorative justice in the city of St. Francis

My daughter is a missing/murdered person.It happened in 2003.We have yet to find her remains. She is still a missing person. It is a terrible [...]

Retaking our streets: Restorative justice in the city of St. Francis

from the article by George Wesolek in Catholic San Francisco: ....The fact that this mindless violence (even though there is a distorted, revenge-oriented gang rationale) is perpetrated by 14-year-old children in some cases, reminds us of futuristic predictions in novels such as “Clockwork Orange” and the like. Killing, for revenge and even for fun, is becoming embedded in the culture, an evil, systemic pall creeping through our streets and into our families and communities and settling there as an alien host. Families in this community live in fear.

"The public wants to be involved": A roundtable conversation about community and restorative justice

from the report by Robert V. Wolf for the Center for Court Innovation: When participants were asked to list the goals of community engagement, six areas attracted broad support: 1. Empowering communities While the concept of giving community members more power is a key ingredient of many initiatives, the nature of the power varies. In San Francisco’s Neighborhood Courts, community volunteers have the authority to determine guilt and can even dismiss cases while volunteers on Atlanta’s restorative justice panels can only adjust the terms of a sentence handed down by a court. For defenders, empowerment involves education—specifically educating the public about the role of defense organizations and navigating the justice system. “Our goal is to help people understand what we do and clarify our role and to trust us,” said James Berry, of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. “We don’t feel an obligation to promote the police or prosecutors, but we do have an interest in helping people to understand what we do and how we help to balance the equation.”

Peacemaking circles become a way of living on Chicago’s South Side

from Ken Butigan's article on waginNonviolence.org: “Four friends of mine were killed this summer,” Jonathan Little tells a group of college students visiting Precious Blood Ministry of Reconciliation, a kind of peace zone in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood. The young man’s voice is somber but composed, as if he has taken the full measure of this abyss of suffering. He has decided that it’s his duty to honor the dead by methodically pushing on with the work — the quest, really — of finding a way out of the storm of violence that bears down on the young in the precincts of poverty and institutionalized racism on the South Side of Chicago.

Restorative justice at OWS

from the post by Stephan Geras on ZNet: ....However these “deeply personalized” new democratic processes will of necessity encounter obstacles and trip blocks which can bring to the surface individual and collective hurt or trauma; or in other words conflict which can obviously be strong enough to provoke violence. What’s referred to as the “cycle of violence” I interpret to mean that violence of any kind is internalized, whether it’s one on one or it’s a result of systemic mechanisms of oppression.

Restorative justice: making neighbourhood resolution panels work

from the article by Keith Cooper in the Guardian: The coalition pledge to boost communities' crime fighting power is due to take a big step forward next year. By March 2012, the Ministry of Justice hopes to announce the first group of officially endorsed neighbourhood resolution panels. These will usher in a new era of "restorative-justice", allowing panels of volunteers – including offenders and victims – to decide how low level crimes should be dealt with. Proceedings will be overseen by a trained member of the public instead of a magistrate or judge; lawyers are barred. The panels conclude with a signed agreement to which all parties agree.

Volunteer hopes McKnight award will bring attention to Somali issues

from Madeleine Baran's report on Minnesota Public Radio: "You have to understand that these are youth who have probably never seen Somalia ... and were born in a refugee camp," Ali, 40, said. "So the best they saw is a hardened kind of life, survival of the fittest. The prime time of their life has been lost, when they could be held, be loved, and play and eat." In response to the study's findings, Ali founded the Center for Multicultural Mediation and Restorative Justice Program. The Minneapolis-based organization holds restorative justice sessions with Somali youth who have been arrested for shoplifting and other offenses. Each session also includes the parents and a community member. "The (community member) will say, 'It's not good for us. You're doing harm to the Somali community, to your family, to everybody in the neighborhood,'" Ali said.

City, community groups express pride following protests

From Jill Replogle's article in Oakland North: As Oakland awaits next month’s sentencing of Johannes Mehserle, the BART police officer convicted last Thursday of involuntary manslaughter in the 2009 shooting of Oscar Grant, authorities, community groups and onlookers congratulated each other on the mostly non-violent protests that followed the verdict last Thursday. Joint planning among city, police and community groups helped keep the peace, they say.

Community justice alternative to sit-lie proposed

from the article on SF Appeal: A San Francisco supervisor today introduced alternative legislation to a proposed, controversial sit-lie ordinance that would be based on a community justice solutions and not simply police enforcement. Board president David Chiu said the ordinance he's proposing would be "a neighborhood-based community justice model" that could serve as an alternative or complement to legislation offered by Mayor Gavin Newsom. Newsom's ordinance, supported by Police Chief George Gascon, would make it unlawful to sit or lie on a public sidewalk between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m.

Dispute Resolution Foundation gets $34 million injection from EU

from the Jamaica Information Service: The work of the Dispute Resolution Foundation (DRF) has been bolstered by a J$34 million injection from the European Union for a project dubbed 'We Want Justice'. The project, which aims to advance democratic rights, through the promotion of alternative dispute resolution, was launched Thursday (March 4), at the Knutsford Court Hotel, New Kingston. It aims to carry out its mandate through mediation, arbitration and restorative justice practices.

Chicago teens encourage nonviolent actions

by David Schaper on npr.org: In Chicago, the problem of youth violence is difficult to escape or ignore. After the highly publicized beating death of a Chicago teenager in September, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan visited the city and called for a national conversation on youth violence. More than a month later, Chicagoans are talking. Some teens are spending long hours strategizing about how to stop violence, but still others voice frustration over attacks that remain a constant in their lives.

A “proactive” restorative conference

from Matthew Kuehlhorm's blog Life Skoolz: As the meeting progressed, tempers cooled and people began to listen. Ultimately, the kids agreed to the boundaries set by security and the college administrators. Campus security also had a chance to meet the kids and now knows who they are when they do come onto campus. Campus is open to them after all.

Finding space for Fido

by Dan Van Ness This is not the story about a violent crime or even school bullying. But it concerns a problem contributing to the quality of life of people in a neighborhood, and of the dogs that some of them own. Dog owners in the Kingfield neighbourhood of Minneapolis want a place for their pets to run free. While there is no park in their district that allows this, some of them unleash their dogs anyhow.

Talking cure: Community Conferencing Center uses restorative justice techniques to deal with crime in Baltimore

They have assembled for what's called a community conference, a conflict-resolution strategy (or, in the lingo of those who practice it, a "conflict transformation" strategy) that will help each of the parties in the room discuss what happened, why it happened, and what everyone would like to see happen to resolve the problem. Once everyone comes to a mutual decision about how the problem should be resolved, everyone in the room signs an "agreement," which outlines the things participants will to do to make amends for the situation that brought them to the conference in the first place.

Moody, Susan R and Mackay, Robert. The Environmental Context of Neighbour Disputes

abstract unavailable

Moore, David B. Managing Social Conflict -- The Evolution of a Practical Theory

This article describes the co-evolution of a process and a theory. Through the 1990s, the process known as "conferencing" moved beyond child welfare and youth justice, to applications in schools, neighbourhoods, and workplaces. In each of these applications, conferencing has assisted participants to acknowledge and transform interpersonal conflict, as a prelude to negotiating a plan of action. Much analysis of conferencing has been linked with social theorist John Braithwaite, whose work has influenced the development of a multidisciplinary theory of these process dynamics, and the development of guiding principles. Key links between theory and practice are described in chronological sequence. Author's abstract.

Schaefer, Diane. A Disembodied Community Collaborates in a Homicide: Can Empathy Transform a Failing Justice System?

Restorative justice concepts and principles transformed by fearful response to a local homicide into anger at 'disembodies community'. Drawing on conversations with residents and newspaper accounts, I analyze the social arrangements in Charleston, Illinois (10,000 population, 20,000 during the academic year) that conspired to isolate neighbors from each other while nurturing the intimidating behaviors of Anthony Mertz, the person arrested for killing Shannon McNamara. I also explore how the implementation of community dialogue guided by restorative justice practices and peacemaking criminology precepts would have created a different social context, a context less likely to have produced the murder in the first place. (author's abstract)

Grenfell, Dale Mary. ROCA- Restorative Justice in a Massachusetts Community

Roca is Spanish for “rock" or “foundation." Located in a highly diverse, multicultural, urban area north of Boston, Massachusetts, Roca, Inc is a values driven agency that began in 1998. Roca, Inc focuses on empowering at-risk youth and young families through programs that promote a real sense of belonging. In this article Dale Mary Grenfell describes its roots in restorative justice principles, peacemaking circles, multicultural programming, and community building. She also identifies some of Roca’s key programs – such as literacy, health, young parenting, and life skills – and she profiles the director of the organization, Molly Baldwin.