PACC holds restorative justice training

By PC Jonathan Beckett, OPP Community Service Officer
Article as it appeared in the Caledon Enterprise, Wednesday, February 3 2010

Caledon, ON - Recently, the volunteers of the Policing Advisory Council of Caledon (P.A.C.C.) delivered a three day training course on Restorative Justice and its application and use within the current Criminal Justice System.

Attendees included police officers from the Caledon OPP Detachment and Toronto Police Service along with representatives from victim’s advocacy groups and other community volunteers from across Ontario.

“One of the strategic objectives for P.A.C.C. is to establish Caledon as a leader in Restorative Justice,” said P.A.C.C. Chair Kevin Junor. “We want to share our successes with other communities and this training session will hopefully enable other communities to achieve the same positive results.”

Restorative Justice aims to bring resolution and closure to an occurrence that has caused harm to an individual or group in the community. This is accomplished by bringing the victim(s) and offender(s) together to discuss the incident in a group setting with the hopes of resolving and repairing the harm. Restorative Justice does not replace the traditional method of charging offenders and sending them through the Criminal Justice System, but is an alternative that has been used in Caledon with tremendous success.

Restorative Justice Forums can be used in relatively minor matters such as vandalism, theft, mischief and minor assaults, as long as the involved parties agree to participate. Restorative Justice Forums often involve young offenders whose attendance in the criminal justice system does not benefit them, the victim or the community.

The benefits of the Restorative Justice Forum include but are not limited to: the incident can be dealt with relatively quickly; gives victims and offenders a voice; it is cost effective; gives everyone involved a chance for closure and is designed to heal the community.

Restorative Justice has been in place in Caledon for several years with excellent success. The forums are facilitated by community volunteers who have taken the training and the participants adhere to a confidentiality agreement.

According to Jane Clarke, the current Chairperson for the Restorative Justice program in Caledon, no one who has participated in the program in Caledon has re-offended.