This is a blog by Keeva Baxter, Project Manager of Why me?’s Damage and Repair Project.
Part of the power of the Restorative Justice process is that it gives people affected by crime a voice – something that both the crime and the justice system frequently deny.
We know that many crimes leave victims feeling disempowered. The subsequent court process, for those that reach that stage, can also be silencing. Whilst some victims of crime may appear as witnesses in a court process, or get to read Victim Personal Statement, they never have a meaningful chance to get their voice heard and their questions answered. Restorative Justice is an opportunity for them to take the power back, ask the questions that remain unanswered and explain the impact of the crime directly to the person that harmed them. Giving people affected by crime a voice is the true power of the restorative process.
But this doesn’t stop at the end of the Restorative Justice process. Some people who have been through the restorative process wish to share their experiences further, for a range of reasons. Some want to spread the word about a process that impacted their life, ensuring that other people can access the benefits that many never find out about. For others, sharing their story can be cathartic, support their healing and keep the legacy of a loved one alive. Finally, Restorative Justice participants sharing their stories can inform the knowledge of criminal justice professionals, academics, students and many more.
Our Damage and Repair project was an opportunity for people who have been through the Restorative Justice process to talk about their experience, share the impact it had on their life, and raise awareness of Restorative Justice in an archive that will last for decades to come. We interviewed 22 people who had either been through Restorative Justice or played a key role in the sector between 2002 and 2022. They shared the successes, challenges and what the processes they had been through looked like. This is a unique insight into a range of experiences that are not usually captured and shared publicly.
“RJ creates the conditions where people can choose to change… The restorative way is to rehumanise others.” – Jo Berry, Why me? Patron and interviewee
What does the archive include?
The archive contains 22 full interviews, each around 1-2 hours long. The rich detail that these interviews captured is a unique asset, and allows listeners to hear stories that they may have encountered before in much more depth. The interviewees have experienced a range of crime types from childhood sexual abuse, to manslaughter and assault.
We also include the testimony of people who have committed crimes, including Peter Woolf, who committed by his own reckoning around 20,000 crimes, and later turned his life around following a Restorative Justice meeting with Will Riley, a man who he burgled and attacked in his home. Will later went on to set up Why me? with Peter’s support.
On top of Restorative Justice participants, we also interviewed professionals who have played a key part in shaping policy, embedding restorative practice in the UK, facilitating conferences and campaigning for wider access. For example, we interviewed Sir Charles Pollard, former Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police who was one of the pioneers of the integration of Restorative Justice into the UK justice system.
Where can you find the collection?
You can listen to the full collection on the Damage and Repair page of our website.
We also collaborated with National Life Stories at The British Library to archive these stories. This means that they will be stored in the Library for many decades to come. You can listen to the collection (C2111) there by making an appointment through the Listening and Viewing Service: Introduction – Sound and Vision – Guides at The British Library.
How can it help you?
These interviews form a rich tapestry of information that can be used by the global restorative community to demonstrate the impact of the process and raise awareness of its power. Here are some of the ways you could use it:
- Allow the testimonies of the people who have personal experience of the process to inform your work. Listening to the successes and challenges that our interviewees experienced can help to inform your practice. What could you learn from those who came before? How can we improve practice to ensure that barriers to the process faced by interviewees are dismantled going forward?
- You can use clips and quotes from the archive to support your communication about Restorative Justice. Allowing people affected by crime to hear about how it works in reality can help them to understand how it could benefit them.
- Use this body of real life stories to support your research, writing or academic work. The collection provides a deep insight into how Restorative Justice has developed over time and covers a range of themes from barriers to justice, Government changes and the impact of the process to their feelings before, during and after.
- Use the learnings from the collection to inform your campaigning work, for example the interviews highlight some key challenges our interviewees had experienced or observed in the justice system.
“If we could just make a difference for other people’s lives then my pain was worth it.” – Joan Scourfield, Restorative Justice participant and interviewee
For more information about the project, to seek consent to use the recordings, or for any queries, please contact Keeva at keeva.baxter@why-me.org.
