00:00:03
[Music]
00:00:09
with the homie broadly you know but it's
00:00:12
it y'all cool place but we call home be
00:00:16
more stand up let's go this is the city
00:00:21
way rock cities free wet psy
00:00:32
no it's just after sunrise in Baltimore
00:00:39
and the city's juvenile warrant task
00:00:41
force is out on the streets rounding up
00:00:44
teenage lawbreakers
00:00:46
[Music]
00:00:49
he's got prior armed robbery charges per
00:00:52
hand gun charges prior carjacking
00:00:53
charges definitely not on the right path
00:00:56
they gave him the chance by sending him
00:00:58
home on some sort of community or home
00:01:01
detention apparently he violated that so
00:01:03
they gave him a chance not to sit in
00:01:05
jail and he obviously blew that so he's
00:01:09
gonna go down or juvenile booking
00:01:10
facility and it'll be up to a judge or a
00:01:12
master there to decide whether or not
00:01:14
they do want to incarcerate in which I
00:01:15
think probably will happen
00:01:20
six days a week city county and state
00:01:23
agencies chase down juvenile offenders
00:01:25
with outstanding warrants
00:01:29
we're gonna be going to the courthouse
00:01:31
down here we've got a gentleman that's
00:01:33
got an open juvenile escape warrant that
00:01:35
also has a pending adult charge an adult
00:01:37
court 2004 was his first entry in our
00:01:40
system that was for trespassing and then
00:01:43
immediately thereafter a CD s possession
00:01:45
with intent so that's I mean that's a
00:01:47
lot of charges for a juvenile and it
00:01:49
seems like from his records here he's
00:01:50
been locked up at least twice a year for
00:01:52
a distribution so these definitely a
00:01:55
narcotic seller and say
00:01:58
this is what they call the deep end of
00:02:01
the juvenile justice system
00:02:03
this young man has been selling drugs on
00:02:05
the streets of Baltimore since he was
00:02:07
about 10
00:02:10
some of these kids get adult charges
00:02:12
they're still in the juvenile system
00:02:13
down here on probation until they're
00:02:16
officially waved into the adult system
00:02:20
so this will probably be the last time
00:02:22
we deal with this gentleman but
00:02:24
apparently he's got close to ten
00:02:27
distribution charges as a juvenile and
00:02:29
then at least one as an adult for many
00:02:35
of these young people the criminal
00:02:37
justice system has become a way of life
00:02:40
once they've entered juvenile detention
00:02:42
the chances of being arrested again are
00:02:45
around 70%
00:02:47
[Music]
00:02:50
kids that go into the system
00:02:52
one it's like a revolving door they find
00:02:55
themselves in and out of jail but then
00:02:59
two kids that go into the system they go
00:03:02
into name network they make friends they
00:03:05
get smarter they get stronger they could
00:03:07
become battle daughter criminals when
00:03:09
they go into the system and obviously
00:03:12
that makes makes our life as police and
00:03:14
detectives more difficult the costs are
00:03:19
staggering
00:03:21
to lock up one young person for a year
00:03:24
costs more than $60,000 the
00:03:28
psychological toll and long-term social
00:03:30
costs are even higher
00:03:34
and along with the serious lawbreakers
00:03:36
the system also sweeps up kids who have
00:03:39
committed only minor infractions
00:03:43
many of those involved with the youth
00:03:45
justice system from cops to judges to
00:03:48
families are urgently seeking
00:03:50
alternatives
00:03:53
the system is horribly broken it being
00:03:57
focused on punishment and focused on
00:04:00
incarceration politicians on both sides
00:04:03
of the aisle realize this I mean it's
00:04:06
not any longer a liberal or conservative
00:04:08
issue when I go to our legislature they
00:04:12
all are not happy with the outcomes but
00:04:16
there's a strange lack of will to do it
00:04:20
any differently dr. Lauren Abramson is a
00:04:23
psychologist and an assistant professor
00:04:26
at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
00:04:28
in Baltimore her interest in youth
00:04:31
justice started years ago when she
00:04:33
worked for Head Start a preschool
00:04:35
program for low-income families there
00:04:39
she had first-hand experience with kids
00:04:42
whose worlds were rocked by violence and
00:04:44
poverty
00:04:46
that the headstart center there's always
00:04:48
a part of the classroom that has
00:04:50
dramatic play and the three and
00:04:54
four-year-olds were playing out funerals
00:04:56
and we're playing out you know somebody
00:05:00
getting stabbed so you see in the
00:05:04
classrooms what their lives are like and
00:05:06
that was a lot of what was going on it's
00:05:08
just something it's not but everybody
00:05:12
got you're just nits and Rockwall is the
00:05:14
buff man Scotia
00:05:18
once they slip into the system I'm not
00:05:20
gonna say that it's impossible for them
00:05:22
to break out of that lifestyle but what
00:05:24
I will say is it definitely becomes far
00:05:27
more difficult for them to turn their
00:05:29
lives around
00:05:30
I got educated you know my parents were
00:05:33
strong they were tough for me I know
00:05:36
that there's a different way to life but
00:05:38
these kids when they get in trouble they
00:05:41
don't have strong parents here in 2012
00:05:44
where of course everybody is in the
00:05:46
financial crisis recreation centers have
00:05:49
been cut programs have been cut they
00:05:51
have nothing to do these kids today are
00:05:56
angry they don't have money so instead
00:05:59
of playing like normal kids used to
00:06:01
these kids are more focused on how to
00:06:03
make money so they can have some of the
00:06:05
things that they see much of what they
00:06:07
need it's a downhill downhill battle at
00:06:11
this point there they're about two
00:06:14
million juvenile arrests annually and a
00:06:17
relatively small percentage of those
00:06:20
children actually end up behind bars
00:06:23
that having been said the United States
00:06:26
locks up children at rates far in excess
00:06:29
of similarly situated countries we lock
00:06:32
up kids at a rate of about 17 times
00:06:35
greater than France for example now
00:06:38
there's nothing in our rates of
00:06:40
delinquency to account for that huge
00:06:42
disparity and we think the pathway to
00:06:45
public safety is paved through the
00:06:47
penitentiary and we happen to rely on
00:06:50
incarceration far more than similarly
00:06:53
governed countries
00:06:55
the best research we have about
00:06:58
delinquency in the United States
00:07:00
indicates that 9 out of 10 teenagers
00:07:04
engage in delinquent acts so delinquency
00:07:07
in America is a normative phenomenon
00:07:09
very common to adolescence of that 90
00:07:13
percent about 36% of the kids suffer an
00:07:19
arrest the other kids they're like me
00:07:22
they were lucky they didn't get arrested
00:07:27
only about 25% of these kids are locked
00:07:30
up for violent acts but the way the
00:07:34
system works instead of changing
00:07:35
behavior upon release more than half of
00:07:38
these kids will go on to commit another
00:07:41
crime in fact a 2011 study showed that
00:07:47
involvement with the juvenile justice
00:07:48
system at a young age is a strong
00:07:51
predictor of adult criminality
00:07:56
that leads some to argue that the system
00:07:59
itself perpetuates the cycle
00:08:03
[Music]
00:08:06
if you take a kid a 16 year old and you
00:08:10
expel them from school under
00:08:12
zero-tolerance for a fight in the school
00:08:15
yard and you prosecute him or her in the
00:08:18
juvenile justice system and sends them
00:08:21
to a year in a Youth Corrections
00:08:22
facility that 300 miles from their home
00:08:25
you are doing exactly the opposite of
00:08:29
what the research would imply you ought
00:08:31
to do if what your ambition is is to
00:08:34
maximize the odds that these kids can
00:08:37
succeed is adults it will turn a rather
00:08:43
docile type person into a hardened
00:08:46
criminal I've seen kids who've been shot
00:08:49
and stabbed on the streets and actually
00:08:50
survived and as a result of surviving
00:08:53
they get a sense of invincible miss if
00:08:58
you will the system definitely hardens
00:09:02
people
00:09:09
- Lauren Abramson and others the
00:09:12
challenge was to figure out a way to
00:09:14
push the system to produce better
00:09:16
outcomes for young people based on her
00:09:24
work in the community and her own
00:09:25
research this is one of the best ladies
00:09:28
in the world that I know Lauren
00:09:29
suspected that the answer might be found
00:09:32
in a powerful but controversial approach
00:09:34
one that relied on emotions Lauren had
00:09:41
studied with a revolutionary
00:09:42
psychologist named sylvan tompkins who
00:09:45
contended that one of the key motivators
00:09:48
of human behavior was emotion
00:09:52
Tompkins drew on Charles Darwin's work
00:09:55
on evolution particularly his focus on
00:09:58
the importance of emotions for human
00:10:00
survival Darwin collected photographs of
00:10:05
different types of people from around
00:10:06
the world showing consistent emotional
00:10:09
reactions proof that the same emotional
00:10:12
response was universal
00:10:16
Tompkins believed that humans were born
00:10:18
with nine basic effects hardwired
00:10:21
responses to stimuli that evolved to
00:10:24
help us survive these effects include
00:10:28
anger shame interest joy disgust fear
00:10:33
sadness surprise and a repulsion to foul
00:10:37
odors for which he coined the term
00:10:39
dismount
00:10:42
five of these were considered negative
00:10:44
effects two of them positive and one
00:10:49
neutral
00:10:52
[Music]
00:10:54
Lauren had worked enough in the juvenile
00:10:57
justice system
00:10:58
to know that the majority of experiences
00:11:00
both offenders and victims had were
00:11:03
overwhelmingly negative and then kids
00:11:09
are stuck angry they're really angry and
00:11:15
then there's just a lack of
00:11:16
opportunities that go along with that I
00:11:18
mean once you've been in prison you you
00:11:21
know felon you can't vote anymore many
00:11:25
places you can't get a job and it just
00:11:27
sets this spiral of on lack of
00:11:29
opportunity and it's devastated our
00:11:32
country it's marginalized two whole
00:11:34
groups of people
00:11:38
Lorin ordinary thinking wasn't going to
00:11:41
change the situation did needed
00:11:44
something radical I had studied the
00:11:47
effects of emotions on health and
00:11:49
illness in a very kind of neuroscience
00:11:52
kind of way and then I had community
00:11:54
work that I was doing and I always
00:11:57
thought that they would sort of be
00:11:58
parallel interests but I I could not
00:12:03
always figure out how to that they would
00:12:05
intersect
00:12:07
a moment of Revelation came for Lauren
00:12:10
when she realized that someone had
00:12:12
already combined these ideas and that
00:12:16
they lived halfway around the world for
00:12:24
nearly a thousand years the Maori people
00:12:27
have called the islands of New Zealand
00:12:29
home today
00:12:31
the Maori make up about 14% of New
00:12:34
Zealand's population where they are
00:12:36
members of several dozen distinct Kiwi
00:12:38
or tribes the Maori are best known for
00:12:46
spectacular cultural traditions like the
00:12:48
haka an aggressive ritual challenge that
00:12:51
incorporates dramatic facial expressions
00:12:54
to intimidate opponents they are less
00:13:02
well known for an effective approach to
00:13:04
justice that gives Lauren hope for
00:13:07
Baltimore
00:13:11
in Auckland New Zealand teenage
00:13:15
offenders their victims and those
00:13:17
involved in their case are called on to
00:13:20
the sacred Maori meeting grounds called
00:13:22
a Mirai
00:13:26
[Music]
00:13:31
once the call has been made by one of
00:13:34
the women of the malai then the guests
00:13:38
start to move forward on to the malai so
00:13:41
they walking with this assurance that
00:13:44
there is a warmth of welcome being
00:13:47
extended to them notwithstanding who
00:13:49
they are notwithstanding what crime they
00:13:51
have performed when they come on these
00:13:55
young people they are equals you never
00:13:58
get that in a quarterly New Zealand law
00:14:02
prohibits revealing the identity of
00:14:04
juvenile offenders so their faces have
00:14:07
been intentionally blurred it's
00:14:11
fascinating watching them coming onto
00:14:13
the Menai with the police who arrested
00:14:15
them as part of the Polly they're all
00:14:16
standing together after they are
00:14:20
welcomed in a ritual called PO weary
00:14:22
they enter the house and greet one
00:14:24
another with an embrace and the
00:14:26
traditional Maori greeting called a Hong
00:14:28
e touching both nose and forehead
00:14:32
represents the exchange of the ha or
00:14:35
breath of life
00:14:38
this is one of the strengths that our
00:14:42
Maori environment can provide it is
00:14:46
therapeutic in that sense the therapy
00:14:49
begins even before the judgement is made
00:14:54
then the people who would say the
00:14:58
auditor thought that we are now one so
00:15:01
your status now becomes merged with the
00:15:05
rest of your hosts
00:15:08
this is one of the final steps of the
00:15:11
juvenile court procedure but the process
00:15:14
is based on a centuries-old Maori
00:15:16
tradition called a Hui the tradition
00:15:21
required offenders and victims to meet
00:15:24
with tribal elders and key family
00:15:26
members to talk out the problem and
00:15:28
settle it themselves with an agreement
00:15:32
the modern version of this process is
00:15:35
called a family group conference
00:15:38
aspects of our culture like karakia
00:15:41
prayer me me acknowledgement we're
00:15:44
singing they all play their role in the
00:15:47
process if anybody comes in like with an
00:15:52
appropriate attitudes angry or
00:15:54
frustrated you know the use of kuraki as
00:15:57
a way of defusing all those types of
00:15:59
things and it puts everyone on the same
00:16:01
playing field and once everybody is down
00:16:07
on the same level then we're ready to
00:16:09
communicate with one another effectively
00:16:10
and most importantly we want to see no
00:16:14
more burglaries in particular and in
00:16:17
this session the presiding judge and a
00:16:19
group of tribal elders are evaluating
00:16:22
how the offender is complying with the
00:16:24
terms of his conference agreement
00:16:27
welcome to you the elders intentionally
00:16:31
put the proceedings in cultural terms
00:16:34
reminding the offender that he's part of
00:16:36
something bigger cuter and cuter - oh hi
00:16:41
Mary Kay McKie and now take total
00:16:44
holistic approaches in addition to the
00:16:47
official authority of the court this
00:16:49
location has symbolic power the Mirai is
00:16:53
the figurative home of all Maori and yet
00:16:56
each Maori ewwy or sub tribe has its own
00:17:00
unique Mirai the elaborate carvings
00:17:03
tells stories of their particular
00:17:05
ancestors and history
00:17:09
by bringing them to the marae it's not a
00:17:12
soft option because all of those
00:17:15
protocols that are observed when you
00:17:18
come to the marae have been observed
00:17:20
ever since Maori arrived here in this
00:17:23
country in Maori villages in the past a
00:17:27
crime would throw the community out of
00:17:29
balance
00:17:31
[Music]
00:17:33
traditional Maori justice turns on the
00:17:36
idea of restoring that balance
00:17:39
[Music]
00:17:42
to achieve that families of both parties
00:17:45
involved with the crime would gather
00:17:47
with tribal elders at the Mirai to
00:17:49
discuss the incident and it was also an
00:17:55
opportunity for the person who committed
00:17:58
the crime to understand the effect by
00:18:01
being there and feeling the the pain
00:18:04
that they've caused
00:18:08
the Maori understood the power of
00:18:11
emotions like shame to motivate us just
00:18:14
as sylvan tompkins research would later
00:18:16
show in the 1960s
00:18:18
[Music]
00:18:20
the group decided together what the
00:18:22
consequences would be for the crime a
00:18:24
decision based on the Maori concept of
00:18:27
o2 or reciprocity the perpetrator and
00:18:32
his family had to compensate for loss or
00:18:35
damage with a payment of food or
00:18:38
property
00:18:39
[Music]
00:18:42
in serious cases like murder this might
00:18:45
require extreme measures for example the
00:18:49
offender might have to give up a child
00:18:51
to compensate for the lost life there
00:18:58
was the idea that by coming up with a
00:19:00
plan of making a means that that would
00:19:05
achieve reconciliation and it would
00:19:08
achieve a restoration of the balance
00:19:11
that had been upset by the crime in New
00:19:16
Zealand's youth justice system the focus
00:19:18
has shifted away from an adversarial
00:19:21
approach towards restoration and
00:19:23
rehabilitation the punishment focus has
00:19:28
not been particularly successful for the
00:19:31
young people we're dealing with so
00:19:36
instead to bring the young offender into
00:19:38
balance not just with his victim but
00:19:40
with his tribe and community judge tao
00:19:43
manu suggested a cultural immersion and
00:19:48
one way of doing that was to return them
00:19:50
to the mariah and to return them to
00:19:52
their roots their original identity as
00:19:56
marvin and work on that strengths work
00:19:59
on all of the issues within this context
00:20:02
of being here exposed to the spirit of
00:20:05
the ancestors and to really give them as
00:20:08
much assistance as we possibly can to
00:20:10
find a new direction in life that
00:20:13
doesn't lead to prison
00:20:16
the Maori tradition has helped transform
00:20:19
New Zealand's youth justice system it's
00:20:22
been so successful that it's been
00:20:24
adopted in Australia and is making
00:20:26
inroads in US cities like Baltimore you
00:20:29
are very lucky those who come here are
00:20:31
very lucky because people here they want
00:20:34
you to succeed we want you to succeed
00:20:37
it's important to remember
00:20:40
come here courting you've been given a
00:20:43
chance at the end of the paper it's all
00:20:49
in the reads okay so come toward the end
00:20:59
of the proceedings the offender receives
00:21:01
final admonishment and encouragement
00:21:04
from his elders you have the potential
00:21:24
to be in a final flourish the young
00:21:38
offender who has been learning more
00:21:40
about his cultural roots Rises and
00:21:42
performs a traditional haka with a group
00:21:45
of supporters
00:21:49
[Music]
00:22:02
but Baltimore doesn't have the haka or
00:22:05
any of the other traditions that help
00:22:07
Maori youth offenders get back on the
00:22:10
right path it's just a completely
00:22:12
different atmosphere the kids today have
00:22:15
no conflict resolution skills everything
00:22:19
is fine people lose their lives over
00:22:21
simple simple disputes still Lauren
00:22:27
Abramson believed that the same
00:22:29
principles driving the success of New
00:22:31
Zealand conferences could happen in
00:22:33
Baltimore that the essential elements of
00:22:36
the group conference telling stories
00:22:39
using the power of shame and empowering
00:22:41
the community to come up with a solution
00:22:43
were Universal but she wouldn't know if
00:22:48
it could work here until she tried it
00:22:52
I was still on the faculty at Johns
00:22:54
Hopkins so in my spare time I would
00:22:56
contact Department of Juvenile Services
00:23:00
schools neighborhoods and it took three
00:23:04
years to get it going
00:23:05
I was nervous then and I still get
00:23:10
nervous when I facilitate which i think
00:23:12
is a good thing I mean you never really
00:23:15
know what's gonna happen in that circle
00:23:20
all the security officer who's by the
00:23:23
end of her first five years of running
00:23:25
the conferencing program twenty-four
00:23:27
hundred people had gone through the
00:23:29
process that meant 290 cases had been
00:23:33
diverted from overburdened courts
00:23:39
most importantly the preliminary
00:23:41
indicators were that kids who had gone
00:23:43
through conferencing were far less
00:23:46
likely to commit crimes again we try to
00:23:50
identify appropriate cases for community
00:23:53
conference at arraignment stage the
00:23:56
arraignment stage is when the case first
00:23:57
comes in and the youth is arraigned told
00:24:01
what the charges are against him that's
00:24:03
an early stage it's a pre-trial stage
00:24:05
and it helps keep the case out of the
00:24:08
system actually and I should tell you
00:24:10
something about the respondents also is
00:24:13
that they're young the cases we most
00:24:15
refer to community conferencing are
00:24:17
assaults thefts and malicious
00:24:21
destruction there are cases that involve
00:24:24
a victim this is Miss Bartlett the
00:24:25
manager because it's low tech and low
00:24:28
admin a single conference cost 90
00:24:31
percent less than a court case
00:24:37
and conferences usually take place
00:24:39
within weeks of the incident while cases
00:24:42
that go to court are often delayed for
00:24:44
months
00:24:47
95% of conferences are successful this
00:24:52
is partly due to intensive training of
00:24:54
facilitators who follow a very specific
00:24:57
simple script
00:25:01
misty Faye has been facilitating
00:25:04
conferences for 12 years I'm gonna go
00:25:06
around and say who everybody is just so
00:25:08
you all know each other and then you're
00:25:11
gonna talk about what happened
00:25:12
conferencing can be especially effective
00:25:15
at handling cases that clog up the
00:25:17
system
00:25:19
these boys broke into a neighbor's house
00:25:22
and stole a roll of toilet paper they've
00:25:25
been charged with first degree burglary
00:25:27
petty theft and destruction of property
00:25:31
it may seem trivial but first-degree
00:25:34
burglary is a felony charge it's the
00:25:36
money we were outside playing football
00:25:42
football at least lady came out and told
00:25:45
us they'd do it too loud
00:25:48
it becomes play football there cuz she
00:25:49
was trying to sleep so we had moved over
00:25:52
to this little area and Tricia had noise
00:25:54
there was a whole little window it was
00:25:56
cream oh yeah no I was like and I seen
00:26:00
that old baby right there and that's all
00:26:02
I seen the holes like and that's why I
00:26:03
was laughing and stuff he had told you
00:26:06
money like you could reach through there
00:26:07
grab it it does we kept old know that
00:26:10
don't do that
00:26:11
but the money took it anyway he threw it
00:26:14
I was just standing looking and that's
00:26:16
when mr. Epps and his wife at came and
00:26:19
he said since nobody wanted to get
00:26:21
parents they were gonna call the police
00:26:23
and that's when police officer was out
00:26:25
there he was asking this question just
00:26:28
to him like felony I'm like 10 years old
00:26:31
and if I don't do anything about this
00:26:33
you have a felony on you
00:26:35
it's just was like it went from innocent
00:26:38
to delinquent and so fast in my eyes and
00:26:41
I was just like I really didn't know
00:26:43
what to do so I was just kind of like
00:26:46
sad
00:26:49
yeah it helped us when we convene a
00:26:52
conference basically we're widening the
00:26:55
circle of who's there
00:26:56
it's each of those young people and
00:26:59
their family members and the people in
00:27:02
their life who they care about and who
00:27:03
care about them when they decide what
00:27:06
can be done to make this better there's
00:27:08
15 people that are part of the solutions
00:27:11
as opposed to two people you know you
00:27:15
don't go messin with people's stuff you
00:27:17
don't go touching things that don't
00:27:19
belong to you
00:27:20
you don't go and touch even if it is
00:27:23
just for fun just to do something
00:27:25
because like this gentleman say here the
00:27:28
consequences are done you get your ass
00:27:30
that's your ass I don't need to be using
00:27:34
vulgar language I apologize but I'm
00:27:36
telling you the severity of it is you
00:27:40
know we all know how we was how we was
00:27:44
all raised to come up we would have got
00:27:45
seriously in trouble
00:27:47
mm-hmm then had to work to pay it off
00:27:50
kids can end up in the system for the
00:27:53
most ridiculous
00:27:55
I kinda mean just kind of really minor
00:27:56
things and then they're stuck in this
00:27:58
system or it could have gotten dismissed
00:28:01
at court at which point nobody really
00:28:04
learned anything from it and they're
00:28:06
back out in the street doing the same
00:28:07
thing within the next day or the next
00:28:10
week instead this case was referred from
00:28:14
the Juvenile Services Division of the
00:28:16
state's attorney's office if it had gone
00:28:19
to court each one of these boys and
00:28:21
their families would have faced a
00:28:22
lengthy legal process you got to hire
00:28:27
lawyers so it puts a stress on finances
00:28:32
to begin with and then the offender
00:28:37
oftentimes will get punished by the
00:28:40
judge will have a sentence the victim
00:28:44
really has no role in court so you know
00:28:48
you're making shorter eggs for the
00:28:50
normal process often results in
00:28:52
frustration misunderstood if they go to
00:28:55
court and victims are kept quiet and
00:28:59
have to sit there and listen to lawyers
00:29:01
arguing and trying to distort things so
00:29:04
that they'll win the case that's just
00:29:08
gonna make them more angry and offenders
00:29:11
don't get a chance to learn how to do
00:29:13
things any differently and and they get
00:29:16
punished and sent away and that makes
00:29:17
them angry what what part did my son
00:29:20
play in it we need to be able to express
00:29:23
our effect it's part of our biology you
00:29:25
know the positive and the negative we
00:29:28
need to be able to to give voice to it
00:29:30
and to not put a lid on it
00:29:32
and so what conferences really do very
00:29:38
powerfully is create a space for people
00:29:40
to do that and when they can give voice
00:29:43
to that then it can shift into something
00:29:46
else as a conference unfolds everyone
00:29:50
gets a chance to tell their story in
00:29:53
doing that the key emotions or effects
00:29:57
present in the Maori process come out
00:29:59
like shame it was kind of stupid cuz it
00:30:08
was just twelve people stupid I almost
00:30:11
10 at one time so I do understand the
00:30:14
boys get bored and rambunctious but they
00:30:17
violated you violated this man's home
00:30:19
you violated him and his wife I don't
00:30:23
want something like that and something
00:30:25
that small can actually alter your whole
00:30:27
life because it was just a kid joke but
00:30:31
that's not a joke you don't do that the
00:30:35
important thing is for the kids to
00:30:38
understand that number one I mean as
00:30:42
adults it happens all the time you have
00:30:43
guilt by association if there is
00:30:45
something going on that you know
00:30:46
shouldn't be going on and you stick
00:30:48
around whether you're a part of it or
00:30:49
not
00:30:49
you're going down just like you were the
00:30:52
one that did it this is this right we
00:30:55
could sit here and go around around and
00:30:57
rail you want to give them every chance
00:30:59
to say what they need to say so that it
00:31:02
can be transformed into something else
00:31:04
and that's the power of it when that
00:31:07
happens a change takes place in the
00:31:09
conference what the facilitators refer
00:31:12
to as the shift the first thing I would
00:31:15
say is mr. Epps I'm sorry that happened
00:31:17
I wish none of this happened I was to me
00:31:20
that once I was told that I committed a
00:31:24
felony I got scared I was mad because I
00:31:29
didn't understand anyway I thought it
00:31:31
was just customer totally people so she
00:31:34
was gonna talk to our parents I might
00:31:37
have to go to bed early or something
00:31:38
like that but no we all got in trouble
00:31:41
for breaking and entering
00:31:48
I try to be a goody two-shoes obviously
00:31:52
crime victims who participate in
00:31:55
conferences are more likely to get
00:31:57
restitution someplace to play perhaps
00:32:00
even more importantly they help come up
00:32:02
with acceptable solutions what do you
00:32:07
guys think should be done to make this
00:32:09
better
00:32:20
[Music]
00:32:22
the shift happens for different people
00:32:25
at different times but it's the point at
00:32:27
which an individual and/or the group
00:32:31
change from being feeling all the
00:32:36
negative effects or the negative
00:32:38
emotions into seeing something from
00:32:42
someone else's perspective and starting
00:32:44
to just slide down the hill into the
00:32:47
more positive effects you can see it in
00:32:51
the circle you can feel it you know like
00:32:54
sometimes it's a laughter like a shared
00:32:57
joke sometimes it's when somebody cries
00:33:01
it's it's just the change that signifies
00:33:06
that everybody's on their way toward
00:33:08
resolution part of the resolution is an
00:33:12
agreement for restitution of some kind
00:33:14
similar to the Maori concept of uh - or
00:33:18
restoring balance in this case the
00:33:21
conference members determined that the
00:33:23
boy should pay for repair of the screen
00:33:25
and also wash mr. Epps truck I really do
00:33:29
believe it has to do with a collective
00:33:30
vulnerability like that we can all feel
00:33:33
each other we can all see each other
00:33:35
everybody's focused in my grandmother
00:33:39
always used to say two heads are better
00:33:40
than one even if one is a cabbage head
00:33:43
that's kind of how it makes sense to me
00:33:47
so you know all of us know things
00:33:50
together that we don't know separately
00:33:53
we all have an innate wisdom that's
00:33:56
built by the innate wisdom of others and
00:34:00
I think that's what this picks up on
00:34:03
youth offenders whose cases are resolved
00:34:06
in conferences are far less likely to
00:34:10
less than 10% go on to commit new crimes
00:34:14
compared to cases dealt with by courts
00:34:16
and juvenile services where nearly a
00:34:19
quarter of the kids are likely to
00:34:24
reoffended umbers are consistent even
00:34:27
when the crimes are more serious it
00:34:31
isn't it absolutely isn't just about
00:34:34
minor cases a lady's house was broken
00:34:37
into in the middle of the night her car
00:34:39
was taken from the front of her house we
00:34:41
are handling felony a lot of felony
00:34:44
offenses and we're getting the same
00:34:46
kinds of outcomes 60% lower reoffending
00:34:50
95 percent of the time they come up with
00:34:52
an agreement that they can abide by
00:34:54
we had a secretary of Juvenile Services
00:34:57
once who said well you can use this but
00:35:00
no cases where there's physical harm I
00:35:02
mean we set up things in our head about
00:35:06
what this shouldn't be used for because
00:35:08
we need to have the serious justice
00:35:10
intervention for those serious cases I
00:35:12
would say you know absolutely this is a
00:35:16
serious justice intervention I think the
00:35:19
hard part for people is to acknowledge
00:35:22
that we have a lot of capability to
00:35:25
resolve these things ourselves
00:35:27
I believe in large parts the system
00:35:33
actually hinders the growth by taking a
00:35:38
kid and just throwing them in jail and
00:35:40
basically forgetting about them at that
00:35:42
point what are you doing what yields
00:35:46
results is people really working
00:35:49
together and really engaged in it and it
00:35:52
can't be the government it's got to be
00:35:55
the people who live there
00:35:57
people can facilitate this process they
00:36:00
can help the community conferencing
00:36:02
center can facilitate it but they're not
00:36:04
the answer they build a bridge between
00:36:07
people to get that done that's where the
00:36:11
work comes from we're talking about very
00:36:15
basic human relationships and a way of
00:36:19
dealing with them which is why I think
00:36:22
it successfully you know would it be
00:36:24
copied and followed in other countries
00:36:27
it's not something that's owned by Maori
00:36:30
even though the idea is based very
00:36:33
firmly and traditional ideas of how
00:36:36
Maori
00:36:37
resolve disputes to resolve conflicts so
00:36:40
I really think of the conferences that
00:36:43
we do as a ritual that lets people be
00:36:49
very human and that lets them take this
00:36:53
incident that has harmed people and that
00:36:55
has caused harm and to be human about it
00:36:58
but to also be able to move that into a
00:37:01
different place
00:37:03
together in a way that's good for
00:37:06
everybody and I like the analogy of in
00:37:10
medicine in the 70s when they discovered
00:37:14
you know the clicker that you get to
00:37:15
manage your pain medicine well they
00:37:18
found out that if people manage their
00:37:20
own pain medicine administration that
00:37:23
they used less medicine and got more
00:37:26
pain relief because they're doing it
00:37:30
themselves and I think that's what
00:37:34
conferencing is like you have to put in
00:37:37
less effort but you're letting people
00:37:39
resolve it themselves and they come up
00:37:42
with incredibly lasting and creative
00:37:45
solutions because they get to decide
00:37:59
for more on fixing juvie justice or to
00:38:02
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