Community Restorative Justice and Practices is a way for communities to respond to conflict, misbehaviour, anti social behaviour and wrongdoing within their locality. It provides a voice for all those affected and to those that want to play a part in their community.

Based on traditional practices from around the world including; Maori (NZ) Family Group Conference model, First Native American community circles, Samoan talking and listening circles, it allows everyone to be part of the solution and seeks to minimise the intervention of 'outside' or professional assistance. It seeks to build on community relations. Building a cohesive, healthy and inclusive community.

Community Restorative Justice Values and Principles

Community Restorative Justice is not a specific programme but mixture of practices that embrace the following values:

Respect. All those living within a community are provided an opportunity for input and participation in the process as early and fully as possible, this will, where possible, involve victims, those who have caused harm and any other interested parties. It recognises that diverse points of view are critical to the creation of wise, effective decisions.  It recognises the integrity of individuals and the reasons for their perspectives.  Support is made available to the parties as they clarify their needs and participate in a restorative plan of action.

Repair. Anti social behaviour and petty crime can lead to communities falling apart, fracturing and eventful becoming no go areas for some people. For some people the hurt, harm and fear that they feel is often contained within. They hold it as a feeling of anger, frustration, rage or hopelessness. The concept of Restorative Justice includes restoring the health and healing of individuals and communities through a reasonable plan of accountability to repair the harm to the fullest extent possible. It is the people in the community, which ultimately must oversee this endeavor.

Responsibility.  We each share responsibility for the members of our community.  Offenders are accountable to the victim and the community for their actions.  Community Restorative Justice recognises that people’s actions, thoughts and attitudes affect others. It is therefore important to take responsibility to act for the greater good. It is equally important for communities to take responsibility for the problems they have and to act accordingly to make the community a better place to live in.

Reintegration.  Community Restorative Justice encourages everyone to take an active roll in integrating all those involved in the wrong doing and anti social behaviour within the community.  Victims receive the services and resources needed as a result of the harm caused. They help the offenders successfully complete obligations associated with making amends to the victim and the community.

Relationship.  Victims, offenders and community members all must be provided with opportunities for input and participation in the Community Restorative Justice process as early and as fully as possible if relationships are to improve and develop. If everyone is given an opportunity to talk and be heard it allows for better understanding from the other parties involve and helps humanise the speaker.

Restoration.  Community Restorative Justice recognises the integrity of every person and the reasons for their perspective. Restoring relationships, the person’s dignity and the community's strength is an essential aspect of this process.

Restorative Community Justice Practices

Victim Offender Mediation (VOM) involves a meeting between the victim and offender facilitated by a trained mediator. With the assistance of the mediator. The victim and offender begin to resolve the conflict and to construct their own approach to achieving justice in the face of their particular crime. Both are given the opportunity to express their feelings and perceptions of the offence (which often dispels misconceptions they may have had of one another before entering mediation). The meetings conclude with an attempt to reach agreement on steps the offender will take to repair the harm suffered by the victim and in other ways to "make things right". Used for a range of incidents including burglary, car theft, vandalism and general nuance.

Family/Community Group Conferencing. Family/community group conferencing enlarges the number of participants in the process to include family members, supporters and other community members. There may be individuals from statutory agencies including; probation, police, community workers etc. It involves the people most affected by the crime–the victim and the offender as well as the family, friends, and key supporters of both–in deciding the resolution of a criminal incident. These affected parties are brought together by trained facilitators to discuss how they and others have been harmed by the offense and how that harm might be repaired. To participate, the offender must admit to the offense. Participation by all involved is voluntary. The facilitator contacts the victim and offender to explain the process and invites them to the conference; the facilitator also asks them to identify key members of their support systems, who will be invited to participate as well.

Restorative Circles. Circles were developed from the First Nation communities in Canada. Circles are used for many purposes. In addition to sentencing circles, which are intended to determine sentences in criminal cases, there are talking circles (used for group discussion of a particular event), peacekeeping circles (circles based on mediating disputes), and healing circles (processes which deal with group therapy). Circles often enlarge the number of participants including victims, offenders, staff, family members, justice officials, and community.  Circles are used in a large variety of communities.  It should be noted that while victims have some needs that involve the offender, they also have needs that do not.  The same can be true for the offender.  Circles can serve both encounter and non-encounter programs.

Victim Offender Dialogue in Cases of Severe Crime. Restorative programs such as dialogue and conferencing are being used for the most severe kinds of crime, including violent assault, rape and murder. Often the offender is in prison. The encounter is not to determine the outcome of the sentence. They are often helpful in providing information and healing for all participants. With appropriate preparation and structure, such encounters have been found to be powerful, positive experiences for victims and offenders. These processes are conducted by individuals who have received extensive training.

Transition Programs. A new restorative program area has to do with transition of offenders following prison. In both halfway houses and in prisons, programs are designed to help victims and offenders as the offender returns to the community.  Circles of Accountability and Support gather a circle of people – ex-offenders, community members, even victims of similar offenses to support the offender but to also hold them accountable. Initially the interaction is a daily check-in with guidelines for what they can and cannot do. Working with the ex-offender to take responsibility for their behaviors, while at the same time offering support has proven successful in reintegrating ex-offenders while allaying community fears.

Community Service. Community service is work performed by an offender for the benefit of the community as a formal or informal sanction. Just as neighborhoods and communities are harmed by criminal and anti social activities, they can be at least partially restored by meaningful service that contributes to their improvement. For community service to be restorative, all affected parties need to have the opportunity to participate in determining what community service is done and the work agreed to is connected to the offense to the extent possible. Additionally, it needs to be specified on how the agreed community service will be monitored by the community. Community service offers one way an offender can be held accountable to repair some of the harm caused by his or her criminal actions.

Community Restorative Boards. A community restorative board is composed of a small group of citizens face-to-face meetings with offenders during a meeting, members discuss with the offender the nature of the offense and its consequences. Then board members develop a set of proposed sanctions which they discuss with the offender, until they reach agreement on the specific actions the offender will take within a given time period to make reparation for the crime. Subsequently, the offender must document his or her progress in fulfilling the terms of the agreement.

Victim Impact Panels. Victim impact panels provide a forum for crime victims to tell a group of offenders about the impact of the crime on their lives and on the lives of their families, friends, and neighbors. Panels typically involve three or four victim speakers, each of whom spends about 15 minutes telling their story in a non-judgmental, non-blaming manner. The offenders of the victims are not present. While some time is usually dedicated to questions and answers, the purpose of the panel is for the victims to speak, rather than for the victims and offenders to engage in a dialogue.

As a result of positive feedback from both victims and offenders who have participated in drunk driving panels, this strategy has been used with other crimes such as property crimes, physical assault, domestic violence, child abuse, elder abuse, and homicide (the survivors serve as panelists).

Victim Impact Class. The victim impact class is an educational program designed to teach offenders about the human consequences of crime. Offenders are taught how crime affects the victim and the victim's family, friends, and community, and how it also affects them and their own families, friends, and communities. Specific modules address property crimes, sexual assault, domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, elder abuse and neglect, drunk driving, drug-related crimes, gang violence, and homicide. Victim impact classes have been adapted for both adult and juvenile offenders in diversion, probation, prison, pre-release, detention, and parole supervised settings.

A key element of the classes is the direct involvement of victims and victim service providers. They tell their personal stories of being victimized or of helping victims to reconstruct their lives after a traumatic crime. Parents of incarcerated youth and community representatives, such as insurance adjusters, may also speak to the class. Offenders are encouraged to enter into a dialogue with the guest speakers.

NetCare have been working with many communities and statutory agencies over the past three years to help develop the use of Community Restorative Justice to help tackle Anti social behaviour, especially amongst the young. In areas we have worked in it has been reported that when communities work together, express their fears, wishes and needs the incidents of anti social behaviour reduces. Every area has had a different result (from 7% to 100% over a year) but all have reduced problems.

Training and Consultancy in Community Restorative Justice has been given to:

London Boroughs of Barking and Dagenham, Hackney, Brent and Camden, Southend Local Authority, Mediation Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Housing Executive, Barnardos and The YMCA.