Restorative Justice! I’d laugh if I weren’t already crying

After being let down by the Police – again! – I left a message on an answer machine requesting some information about the Restorative Justice project.

Today the Inspector dealing with it returned my call. Firstly, he ensured I fully understood just how profuse his apologies were for not getting back to me last Tuesday as promised. He told me how frustrated and angry he was when he realised that he would be unable to call me because he was being sent on a course. He also let me know that he had tried to get a message to me and that he was sorry it had not been passed on. When we had both pretended that I accepted this ‘sincere’ account of events he turned to the real issue – the Restorative Justice I had:

         specifically requested,

   had it offered by the CPS - via my FLO

         had it denied - but no one had bothered to inform me about that, 

   repeated the request for RJ

         been assured it would be looked into, but had been overlooked in favour of a
   course.

Isn’t the Criminal Justice System just marvellous! No? Well to be honest, it makes me so angry, I want to vomit.

The short version is that my request was denied. The fuller explanation is full of platitudes but still ends in the same way – request denied.

It seems that although the probation officers originally made the offer of RJ, they now consider the taxi driver’s mental state too delicate to go ahead. He is feeling low and therefore it would not be helpful for him. Never mind what would be helpful for me and mine – we need to respect the Human Rights of the man who saw my son crossing the road and chose to neither slow down, nor even attempt to avoid him until it was too late to avoid killing him. What about my son’s Human Rights? What about those of my girls’? What about mine?

Additionally, just in case I get any ideas about waiting until the poor lamb feels better, they say that he is unable to fully comprehend the purpose of RJ, that he cannot understand the rules, that he is unable to empathise, and that he cannot even make eye contact when speaking with others.

Odd that he managed to make eye contact with me when I briefly spoke with him immediately after he was released from court with a 3-year driving ban and a 6-month suspended sentence. Yes, his manner was odd but then it would be as it was clear to me that he has learning difficulties. I don’t understand why the powers that be have dressed this up as ‘social awkwardness’ and ‘poor social manner.’ It is screamingly obvious that this man has low intelligence. Everything about his manner strongly suggests that when he was at school, he would probably have been labelled, ‘slow’. Yet somehow, he managed to obtain a driving licence. Can you believe that? Some simpleton decreed him fit to take a lethal weapon on the roads. And, presumably following an interview, another employed him as a driver. What kind of fool employs someone with such low intelligence to drive a car? The kind who puts profits before safety, and who doesn’t give a damn I guess.

I have run RJ projects with adolescents and, as I explained to the Inspector three weeks ago, it takes time to lead them through the process so that they fully understand what it entails, and what is required of them BEFORE they actually meet with the other party. However, my impression is that, as this wouldn’t be a nice and easy box-ticking exercise, my request has been denied. They have dressed it up as impinging on his Human Rights but really, this is about making life easier for those employed within the Criminal Justice System. And to hell with those who have been left devastated by their actions.

I’m beyond angry right now. And I feel so impotent. The man who killed my son was never really brought to justice – not in the true sense of the word. Instead he, and my family, were forced to endure a sham of the trial that never was. He has never been made, or even offered the opportunity, to face up to what he did. He will never know just how my family has been decimated because those who think they know better have decreed it thus.

I don’t feel any anger towards this man. I feel a complete and overpowering fury at a system that has cultivated and nurtured the dismissal of Victims and their needs as irrelevant, and placed the wishes and (perceived) needs of the guilty as paramount.

It has also disregarded the need to protect future victims. I’m told that there is nothing I can do to prevent this man from reapplying for his driving licence in three years time. He has been prevented from having any real comprehension of what he has done so how can he be expected to understand that he should never, ever drive again? He can reapply for his licence and, provided he passes a test, will be certified capable of driving yet another potentially lethal weapon. All this after he has been cosseted and protected from understanding the full impact of what he has done. What kind of madness is this where a man can kill, and then be PROTECTED from acquiring the knowledge to help ensure he doesn’t kill again?

This system, which is allegedly in place for the protection of the society in which we live, has only worked FOR the offender and right now, I want to line up the people who have supported such a system in its attempted annihilation of my family:

-    the CPS lawyer who changed the charge at the last minute to make her job in court easier

-    her line manager who supported her actions by saying that lawyers were entitled to arrive at different conclusions after months of sticking to the same ones

-    the judge who refused to allow my Victim Impact Statement to be read in court - no need to bore the room with a Mother's grief

-    the FLO who thinks he’s such a nice bloke but who is so frighteningly unconsciously incompetent,

-    the Senior Investigating Officer who, months ago, blatantly told me that RJ would not go ahead and who is due to retire soon and, so I’m told, says that my ‘case’ and one other are the two which do not sit easily with him

-    the Probation Service staff who have decided that it’s just too much effort to do RJ with a man who has Special Ed Needs – and stuff what the Victim’s family wants or needs!

-    the Inspector who promised to look into this but instead merely placated, delayed and said no in the end anyway

I want to point a gun at each of their heads. I want to watch them sweat and plead for mercy. I want to tell them that they will be shown as much mercy, as much care, as much consideration as has been shown to me and mine.

And then I want to shoot at their knees – left one first – one person at a time for maximum effect. And then go back and shoot at each person’s right knee. And when they are all lying in agony, screaming in pain, I want to shoot at their genitals. After all, they have collectively subscribed to the ‘let’s kick a dog when it’s down’ approach so it seems only right and fair that they fully understand exactly what they have signed up to.

I want maximum devastation. I want complete and utter pain. I want them to know what it’s like to feel that someone else has the power to pulverise their lives into nothingness, and for them to know that they are powerless to stop it happening.

I want to say that I’m truly sorry and to ask each of them if they would like some crutches and then assure them that they will be obtained as soon as possible. Then I want them to wait and wait, all the while in abject agony, waiting for that person in a position of power to grant some relief. And then I want to walk in the door with the crutches and say, “Oops sorry – no can do – byeee.” And walk away, taking the crutches with me, just as they’ve done, and without a backwards glance.

Of course, I won’t do any of those things. I’m better than that because I’m somehow hanging on to the fact that I’m a human being - OK I have to keep reminding myself of that little fact but I am better than they are. I have to hang on to that because right now, just by wanting/needing that revenge, I’m only just better than they are. The death of my precious boy didn’t turn me into a vengeful woman - a vengeful woman fighting to hang onto her decency and integrity. The sheer, crass, indecent, inhumanity of the system allegedly designed to protect people like me, managed that.

 And now I have a new battle – to become the woman I was. The one who never wanted revenge. The one who accepted that grief was inevitable and to be expected yet was so insistent that her boy’s death must not be allowed to turn her or her daughters into bitter, vengeful beings. Now there’s an uphill climb. Wish me luck.