A Path Towards Restorative Justice at the Community Level

Loren Huck, Chair of the Spruce Plains Restorative Justice Committee, explained what Restorative Justice is and the mandate of the local Restorative Justice committee.  The Restorative Justice Committee is formed to deal with alternative measures and to provide a forum for education, disposition and reconciliation of offender within a community and to provide the community with information and education concerning crime and crime prevention. He also mentioned that the committee is funded by the Justice Department of Manitoba with specific aims and objectives. “It’s a very broad mandate that we have but we see the justice alternative being quite integral within the community and a form of a healing basis for the community between the victims and offenders.”, said Huck.  

Mark Morehouse, member of the committee and a retired RCMP officer, shared that that the area of coverage of the Spruce Plains Committee is anywhere from Rapid City to north of Kelwood, Glanella, Neepawa & Gladstone. He also discussed how the process works which starts when the court refers the case to the committee. It could be a youth or an adult offender, and they are given an information sheet submitted by the RCMP. Upon review and discussion, the committee decides to accept or refuse the case. They usually accept first time offenders because they think repeat offenders need to experience the full measure of the law.

After accepting the case, they meet with the offender and discuss with them the consequences. For a first time youth offender, they are asked to write a letter of apology to the victims and present it to the committee and the victim so they can make some reflections on what they did. It could also be reinforced with community service hours. The committee also helps in monitoring if the offender is completing the hours of community service or other consequence they agreed to do. The John Howard Society, in partnership with the RCMP, supervises whether they live up to the agreement.

Huck shared that the committee has been around for a long time.  “I was just looking at our membership roster here the other day and we have a member that has been active in the committee for 30 years. I’ve been around for 21 years and Mark came on in 2013. For the most part, it’s been an active community working with the Justice system within the area of Neepawa. Before, it’s just for youth offender and two years ago, it was open for adults as well. I think this is also to address the backlogs at the court system. We are working closely with the John Howard Society and take some direction from them in terms of developing consequences and mediation”, said Huck.  

Morehouse and Huck both agree that the approach is effective based on their experience as part of the committee. Morehouse said “I feel since I’ve been on it as member of the RCMP and now, and that has been a few years, that I think there were only two repeaters overall. Huck added, “The beauty of Restorative Justice is that they come before us, they admit their guilt, they sign off on their guilt, accept the consequences and as long as they live up to the requirements that we give them, they walk away with no criminal record”.