Corrections_Today_May_June_2019

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easy” when considering justice system responses to those who have caused them harm. Sered characterizes victims as pragmatic and with the goal of attaining greater safety. Crime victims seldom expect incarceration to meet this personal safety goal. Discussing accountability, Sered first argues that our current criminal justice system falls short in this area. She illustrates how various aspects of our court and corrections systems conspire to minimize a perpetrator’s opportunity to accept responsibility for causing genuine harm to individuals. Within the court system, perpetrators are often advised to admit nothing until a plea deal has been reached, and then to admit guilt for a limited act often quite inconsistent with the specific behaviors the individual actually performed. If they do plead, consequences of their behavior on the victim or others in the victim’s personal orbit. While incarcerated, they “do time,” an existence with little or no connection to the situation they created through their actions. Little or nothing is expected of them to repair the harm they caused. In too many instances, they are offered few opportunities during incarceration to prepare for living a life inconsistent with their past actions. Within the restorative justice process described by Sered, persons responsible for harm are described as “doing sorry.” Sered recounts a brief story of how this odd they will rarely face their victim, and they may never know the

term spontaneously emerged in a conversation with a client during a discussion of his case. She embraced the term “doing sorry” and now uses it frequently to describe what a restorative justice participant in the Common Justice program must do to take responsibility for prior actions, to acknowledge the impact those actions had, to make amends for that harm and to establish a crime-free life. Individual plans vary, but the examples Sered provides include common elements. Within the restorative justice process described by Sered, persons responsible for harm are described as “doing sorry.” First, a person must “own” the criminal acts they committed by confronting the full extent of the harm caused by their actions. They must commit to actions intended to make their victims whole to the highest extent possible. They commit to a process of personal change and development. Their developmental activities might include journaling, public speaking, setting and working toward educational goals, and completing occupational training and/ or internships and apprenticeships. These persons engage with crime victims in a variety of contexts; they join and attend “groups” with a range of goals, they accept counseling, they

do individual or community service, and they undertake a variety of other personalized, goal-focused actions. Sered recounts comments from a variety of participants who found these commitments challenging. Those comments most often focused on the challenge of “owning” their prior behaviors and the consequences of their actions. Sered draws a stark contrast between what these persons undertake versus the experience of incarceration in U.S. prisons or jails. She “calls out” our correctional system for the prevalent idleness and pointlessness which too often characterizes “doing time” in U.S. correctional facilities. Sered does not maintain that restorative justice is an appropriate response in every case. First, as previously mentioned, it is available only with the consent of the victim. Second, the perpetrator must agree to fully accept responsibility and to engage in an extended process. There is no record of this crime on a person’s record pending successful completion. Surprisingly, Sered does not make a specific claim about what proportion of “cases” might be appropriate for the restorative justice alternative. She does not cite success rates other than to say that they have experienced only one failure in the Common Justice program. Her reader does not know if this is one failure out of 20 cases or one failure out of 2,000. Nor do we know what period of time has elapsed since these individuals successfully completed their programs, as Common Justice is

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