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Further, research has demonstrated higher rates of compliance,
and lower rates of recidivism among offenders who participated in a mediation process,
than those who did not. An analysis of fourteen studies of juvenile offenders,
including 9,000 offenders, found that those who participated in mediation programs
committed fewer and less serious offenses in the future.
For those wishing to learn more about mediation in criminal matters,
please consult the following resources.
Many of these are available directly on the web, or through local libraries.
For those interested in establishing or expanding a mediation resource for your community
or in your jurisdiction, we encourage you to seek partnerships with relevant state holders and offices.
These would include judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, police officers,
and probation officers, as well as re-entry resources, and victim advocacy organizations.
The broader your array of partners, the greater insight, expertise on which the program
can be built to ensure its effectiveness.
On behalf of the American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section,
I hope you found this to be a valuable resource.
Please consult the section website for additional information.
Hi, my name's Karen Gopee, and welcome to the Red Hook
Community Justice Center. You just heard Tim go through an
overview of the mediation process, and the history of mediation. Now I'm going to focus on typical parties of
mediation, typical kinds of cases, programs that exist in New York, and the benefits of mediation.
What better place to have a discussion about alternate dispute resolution
than the Red Hook Community Justice Center, the nation's first multi-jurisdictional community court
offering one court room, one judge, and alternate dispute resolution services right on site.
Here, in addition to regular criminal court dispositions, we offer on site such services and treatment as
drug treatment, various substance abuse and alcohol treatment,
counseling, community service, education, job training, and you may have guessed it, mediation.
Before we get into the specifics of mediation, let's speak about 'Why now?'
Why explore any mediation programs at this date and time?
Now, most jurisdictions are moving away from the strictly punishment-based approach,
and are adopting new creative ways of processing and handling cases.
Let's talk about the state of affairs. Case loads are increasing.
The police department is ever growing, and translates into more arrests,
more quality of life offenses that we're seeing in particular in New York.
An already constrained system is now facing budget crisis.
Budget crisis means that the district attorney's office is now having to either
reduce staff or not hire new attorneys, legal aid, or public defenders offices.
Same thing. Less attorneys handling more cases means less time to spend on any individual case.
The court system, the number of criminal court judges are pretty much remaining the same.
Same amount of judges for more cases means more cases on your calendar,
less time to spend on each case, and basically adopting a triage of processing approach
as opposed to individual attention.
One judge on the bench describes it as "McJustice," comparing it to McDonald's or any
other food chain being passed from the police to the attorneys to the court
and then back to community. Nothing solved, nothing changed, nothing helped.
The end result is dissatisfaction.
Dissatisfaction from the court players, dissatisfaction from the community.
It's time to think outside of the box. It's time to change and offer new solutions,
partner with outside agencies, and handle cases differently.
In recognition of this need, the unified court system in charge of the court throughout New York state
has partnered with private organizations, local community dispute resolution centers.
They provide some funding, they provide the referrals to cases,
and the mediation centers through the intake, meet with the parties
and then if an agreement is reached, report that agreement back to the court.
There are more than 60 such mediation centers.
There is one that exists in each county in New York state.
They handle an excess of 90,000 cases a year.
That's 90,000 cases, with 80% of the participants reporting being satisfied with the
overall process, even if they don't resolve every issue.
The typical parties involved in the cases that are referred are landlord-tenant, neighbors,
parent and child, basically family members, merchants, consumers, co-workers,
basically parties that have an ongoing, continuous relationship.
Cases are referred both from the courts and by law enforcement, whether it be
the district attorney's office, probation, or the police department.
Once such community dispute resolution center is Safe Horizon, our partner in this project,
pride themselves on being the nation's leading victim assistance, crime prevention,
and victim advocacy programs.
They have partnered with the Kings County District Attorney's Office,
and is exploring a partnership with the courts in Manhattan to offer mediation
in criminal court cases, minor assault, loss and any property damage,
where parties are known to each other, related, or have on-going relationships,
such as co-workers, school mates, neighbors.
In addition for juvenile matters, Safe Horizon has partnered with Corporation Counsel
and the Department of Probation to offer victim-offender mediations or dialogue, in more
serious cases involving assault, burglaries, *** offenses including *** assault, and homicide cases.
Another New York City program, one that was recently established, is a partnership
between the Kings County District Attorney's Office and the Vera Institute of Criminal Justice.
They offer mediation felony cases involving burglary, robbery, and assault, where the offender
is between the ages of 16 and 24, and is likely to be sentenced to some time in jail.
Upon successful completion of the program, the felony conviction is vacated,
leaving the misdemeanor conviction, and the offender is sentenced to programs
and community-based services as opposed to any jail time.
Then there are other programs in New York state where the mediation is offered right on site,
such as at Red Hook.
It's typical for a case to be heard in court, the parties to be referred to mediation,
and then within a couple of hours the mediation to actually be conducted,
the resolution agreement to be signed, and then we're back before the judge on the
same day or a court date shortly thereafter, and incorporated as part of the disposition to the case.
What quick handling of the matter, and what great resolution of the underlying dispute.
Some of the typical cases that are referred that we see over and over again in all mediation programs
are the basic cross complaint, meaning two individuals, minor injuries, both arrested,
either both being charged and both either interested in just walking away and forgetting about it,
or in fighting to the end and prosecuting each other with no real resolution of the underlying issue,
which pretty much means that when they walk out the door, they'll be back.
You have the typical love triangle.
Two individuals fighting over someone else, and then you start off with the aggravated harassment,
the phone calls, the threats, the pushing, the shoving, the property damage,
whether it's the car or the person's house.
Continuing criminal conduct, continuing escalating conduct, could potentially be
very serious if not dealt with.
Co-workers or classmates, some dispute over who knows, desk space, and before you know it, assault.
One of the cases that I handled as a prosecutor involved competing
ice cream truck companies fighting over the same turf.
Started off with the typical calling each other names, then property damage,
flattening each other's tires, destroying equipment, and before you knew it, arson.
Now that case could have been handled and resolved by sending them to mediation,
letting them discuss it, possibly discuss dates and times that they can be on whichever block
or whichever section of the neighborhood, and then we may not have seen them again.
You are going to see a dramatization of a mediation.
It involves a young girl, her name is Samantha.
She was recently arrested and charged with grand larceny, the felony, for taking Amy,
the victim's, bank account information and using it along with her boyfriend to access
and pay for a *** site.
Over the last several years, the boyfriend had continued using the account to continue paying
for that *** site, and incurred more than $5,000 worth of charges.
Samantha has long since broken up with him, but she recently logged on to a website
using Amy's information just to check whether or not it was still valid, and realized that it was,
which led to her arrest and her appearance before the judge.