[Applause] and I'm not singing I Will Survive today I know I know it does avoid him can forgiveness transform the criminal justice system forgiveness criminal justice I know there's someone out there thinking no way he broke into my house he took all of my valuables I can't forgive him there's also somebody who might be saying but she tricked me out of a thousand dollars it was my last $1,000 and I was saving it up for my rich how can I forgive that person there's probably also somebody thinking he hit me he hit me and he
destroyed our family forgiveness forgiveness in the criminal justice system before we talk about the concepts of forgiveness in the criminal justice system I want each of you all to just think about a time where somebody hurt you think about a time maybe it was your spouse or your may or perhaps it was you know a parents or a sibling you know or worse yet your best friend someone you can fight it in someone that you gave your all t and they betrayed you how did that make you feel how did that hurt make you feel
and how did you work to get through that hurt and how did you forgive that person when we think about forgiveness Webster's definition of forgiveness is to stop feeling anger toward someone who has done something wrong or to stop blaming someone or to stop feeling anger about something so let's go back to that time when you were feeling hurt how did you move from that hurt feeling to forgiveness well that one thing that you needed to get over this hurt was you needed that person who hurt you to recognize truly recognize how you were hurt
and you also wanted that person to acknowledge what they did and how that hurt you and it also made you feel so much better if that person not only recognized your hurt and what they did to cause it hurt but also what they could do to help you to get through that hurt true forgiveness now when we think about the criminal justice system just raise your hand if you already know how the criminal justice system kind of works anybody has somebody now I'm not gonna ask you how you know how the criminal justice system works
but just raise your hand if you know a little about the criminal justice system and so for those who don't let me talk to you about criminal justice 101 say crime occurs and the system works to find that person who caused that crime and once that person is identified then there's a system where a formal process begins that person is usually charged could be arrested there's a prosecution that's appointed to represent or to take care of that case and the prosecution's job is to represent the interest of the state not the interest of the victim
the interest of the state and the person who was charged with the crime will call that person the defendant the defendant is entitled to have an attorney and that attorneys job is to zealously represent his client that attorneys job is to make sure that their client is presumed innocent until proven guilty throughout the entire stages of that proceeding and they're gonna hold that system to that bourbon so when we think about the criminal justice system there really are three questions that we focus on what laws have been broken who did it in what do they
deserve and when we focus on those questions we don't really have the opportunity to think about the harm the victim and how we cure that harm so I'm going to spend a few minutes talking about a few of criminal cases that most of you probably have heard a little about some very famous cases one of them from my alma mater the Vanderbilt University rape case now this is not what we're proud of we're proud of all the other many things but the Vanderbilt University rape case which probably many of you heard about already now I'm
not going to discuss the case or the facts or the things that happen but what I do want us to focus on is the statements that were made by the victim when she had an opportunity to make a statement there are several things that she stated about the criminal justice system and about how it made her feel one thing she said was it's hard for me to stand here on display and speak to you today about the impact this has had on my life the thought of sharing anymore of myself that hasn't already been taken
from me seems unbearable and it goes against every instinct that I have she went further on to say the attack on me didn't end that day because I relive it in every proceeding and experienced additional tax every time that I am in court she also stated since the horror of that night all I have wanted is for this to be behind me to be left alone and it tried to live my life in peace but the process to get to justice has been a never-ending constant misery that has twisted itself so into my life that
I can't even remember what it was like at a time when this wasn't happening everything the defendant has done in this case and the media circus surrounding it had been a continuous disruption repeatedly dragging me back every step I try to take forward and she further stated it made me angry because I didn't have a voice and I couldn't say anything and that's also look at the Stanford University rape case very similar circumstances very similar case again focusing on her statement the victim stated I thought there's no way this is going to trial there were
witnesses there was dirt in my body he ran but was caught he's going to settle formally apologized and we will both move on she also said instead of taking time to heal I was taking time to recall the night in excruciating detail in order to prepare for the attorneys questions that would be invasive aggressive and designed to steer me off course to contradict myself my sister phrased in ways to manipulate my answers she further went on to say had Brock admitted guilt and remorse and offered to settle early on I would have considered a lighter
sentence respecting his honesty grateful to be able to move our lives forward and finally she stated I also told the probation officer that what I truly wanted was for brought to get it to understand and to admit his wrongdoing it's clear in both of these examples that our criminal justice system fails in many ways our criminal justice system does not allow an opportunity for the harms to be discussed an opportunity for a ability to defigurates the store ative justice would it have made a difference if we had a system that allows for forgiveness so let's
talk a little about what is restorative justice according to how it's there who is the king or the the Godfather of restorative justice here in the United States he defines restorative justice as an approach to achieving justice that involves to the extent possible those who have a stake in a specific offense or harm to collectively identify and address the harms needs and obligations in order to heal and put things as right as possible so restorative justice moves to conversation from who did the crime and what they deserve and moves it to a questions of who
has been harmed what are their needs and whose responsibility our obligations are those to fix that arm if I get it it's kind of strange sounding how does restorative justice really work in a system astre storeit of justice when an incident occurs that would normally be a criminal offense the person who committed the offense the victim family members and members of the community gather together in a restorative community conferencing and at that conferencing they discuss the crime they discussed the causes of the crime and the effects of the crime and as they're discussing they come
together with a consensus-based plan I plan for that person who did the harm to cure the harm to both the victim the families involved the community as a whole and for themselves it's a time for true self-reflection it's a time for a firm yet structured and supportive accountability for that person who did the harm and a commitment for everyone at the conferencing circle to commit to helping that person overcome obstacles and to learn to do what's right it's a system that works in communities that have restored with justice what they have found is that the
recidivism rate are the rate that someone gets real that riaf ends after they've gone through a program the recidivism rate is greatly reduced in the victim satisfaction rate with the system is greatly improved so let's take Alameda County California for instance they have a juvenile court restorative justice program and in that program they have a 91% satisfaction rate for the victims and also in that program for the youth that come back to the program the recidivism rate for those in an 18-month period that have gone through the restorative justice process is less than 20% which
is a stark difference from the forty percent of those that come back that have not gone through restorative justice program so restorative justice in New Zealand is the thing that they do that's what they do they don't do a regular criminal justice system they start off with a restorative justice program and there are several communities in the United States that have done it as well for instance Alameda County San Francisco Long Beach California and Baltimore Maryland and all those programs the ones here are juvenile programs which makes me proud because Girona courts always on the
cutting edge of doing things the right way but in these programs the restorative justice works and it's defined as according to an article called kin forgiveness be a part of our criminal justice system that's in the New York Times most modern justice systems focus on a crime a law breaker and a punishment but a concept called restorative justice considers harm done and strives for agreement from all concerned the victims the offender and the community on making amends and it louse the victims who often feel shut out of the prosecutorial process a way to be heard
and participate now you may ask I get it I get where restorative justice can work in a juvenile court facility or program but can restorative justice work as an adult program if you read the article can forgiveness play a role in criminal justice the answer is yes we can do it in the adult criminal system as well I'm gonna tell you about one particular case that it has been very successful in but before I tell you about the case I need to tell you about my mentor one of my favorite people in the whole entire
world her name is Sujata Baliga and Sujatha is the director of the restorative justice practice for impact justice in California and they are the leading cutting brand of doing restorative justice Sujatha who by herself was a child victim of sexual assault just had a love for two Beeson ideas and she worked with children and women who were victims of sexual assaults and that work led her to law school and then her own search for forgiveness as a victim led her to become one of the founding greatest people working with restorative justice and so because of
her work a family actually two families a defendant family and a victim's family reached out to her this family was in Florida and they were struggling of a murder case it was a domestic violence murder case as they wanted to do restorative justice the father the article if you'll read it says Ann's face was covered in bandages and she was incubated in unconscious but Andy felt her say forgive him his response was immediate no he said out loud no way it's impossible but Andy kept hearing his daughter's voice forgive him forgive him and from Connor
the defense after the restorative justice process was done stated hearings of pain and their voices and what my actions had done really opened my eyes to what I've caused in the victim's family and observations about them goes on to say the gross Meyer said they didn't forgive Connor for his sake but for their own everything I feel I can feel because we forgave Connor Kate said because we could forgive people can say her name people can think about my daughter and they don't have to think owes a murdered girl I think that when people can't
forgive they're stuck all they can feel is the emotion surrounding that moment I can be sad but I don't have to stay stuck in that moment where the awful thing happened because if I do I may never come out of it forgiveness for me was self persuasion and finally what they define forgiveness forgiveness doesn't make him any less guilty and it doesn't absolve him of what he did but in refusing to become Connors enemy the gross Myers deprived him of a certain kind of refuge of feeling abandoned and hated and placed the reckoning of the
crime squarely in his hands now I get it forgiveness is hard forgiveness is a heart they it doesn't happen overnight you have to work to get there forgiveness is something that we've talked about since we were little and you know most religions talk about forgiveness and we even sing about it and some songs like you know y'all remember Purple Rain from Prince I never meant to cause you any problems never meant to cause you any pain or we could think about big old good Chicago song you know the one I want to forget the song
hold me now it's hard for me to say I'm sorry and that advant got famous all for her song about apologies and being sorry hello that's all you get but when you think about forgiveness we as a society has to find a place for forgiveness in our criminal justice system and restorative justice will lead the way you may not be ready yet but as sudah always says we'll get there we may not be ready yet but we'll get there thank you and enjoy your day [Applause] you
