More than 55 members and leaders from restorative justice groups and organizations across Illinois met at Adler University in Chicago on Sept. 20 for their quarterly City-Wide Restorative Justice Meeting.
The goal: Learn how Northern Ireland has utilized restorative justice conferences with youth to positively impact its community, reducing reoffending rates to 47%, compared to 70% for traditional sentencing.
“Only through healing can we truly break the circle of violence,” said Circuit Court of Cook County Judge Sophia Hall, as she welcomed attendees — both in person and online. Judge Hall oversees the Juvenile Justice and Child Protection Resource Section, which serves as liaison to the academic, business, and religious communities to identify and develop services and resources that will augment programs vital to juvenile justice.
Judge Hall, along with Juvenile Justice Initiative founder and interim Executive Director Betsy Clarke, welcomed representatives from the Youth Justice Agency. The Northern Ireland government agency utilizes restorative justice principles while working with children aged 10-17 years who have offended or are at serious risk of offending.
Restorative justice promotes direct accountability for harm through conflict resolution and healing as an outcome rather than punishment and incarceration. This practice allows persons who were harmed (victims) an active role as part of the healing process and gives them a voice in the justice system. For those who have committed harm, it allows them to take responsibility, have accountability, and make amends.
Despite being separated by thousands of miles and the Atlantic Ocean, restorative justice champions from Belfast, Northern Ireland, and Chicago have a lot to learn from each other.
For 30 years, starting in the 1960s, Northern Ireland was enveloped by violence as Protestants and Catholics violently addressed their differences — much of it political — during what is known as “The Troubles.” The generation-spanning conflict ultimately ended in 1999, after 3,500 people were killed and 50,000 injured. The legacy of that trauma continues to impact many of Northern Ireland’s children and young people.
“The Northern Irish people had the wisdom to know that sustaining peace would depend on healing the damage done to their children,” Judge Hall said. “This realization speaks to Chicago’s challenges in our neighborhoods where our children are also traumatized by violence and the fear of violence.”
During the meeting, which was organized in part by the Institute on Public Safety and Social Justice (IPSSJ), attendees heard from Donna Murray and Gary Halliday, who shared their decades-long experience conducting restorative justice conferences with the Youth Justice Agency. These included information on the process, the evolution of their trauma-informed approach, the challenges they continue to face, and the positive impact the work is having.
The agency’s restorative justice work has led to 54% reduction in first-time entrants of youth to the judicial system, 61% reduction in daily average numbers of youth in custody, and 59% reduction in children prosecuted by youth court.
Chicago-area organizations and agencies, many of them present at the meeting, are hopeful their continued efforts to utilize restorative justice practices and principles, including those that have worked in other parts of the world, can also lead to similar results and safer neighborhoods all around Illinois.
Following the presentation from Youth Justice Agency, IPSSJ Executive Director Elena Quintana, Ph.D., shared with the attendees her team’s continuing efforts that utilize restorative justice practices and principles.
In 2022, IPSSJ joined a collaborative led by the Office of the Lt. Governor’s Justice, Equity, and Opportunity Initiative, to launch Healing Beyond Harm restorative justice program. A first-of-its-kind in the state, the program aims to use the power of words to fill the space that is often created by pain, to be a bridge to healing from one person to another, and in the process, break down obstacles to moving forward beyond harm.