Victim-Offender Dialogue? You Have to be kidding!
by Patrick M. Wolff, Esq.

“You have to be kidding” is a common reaction when managers first hear about the
idea of victim-offender dialogue, as provided on Guam by Inafa’ Maolek Mediation Center. Imagine a scenario whereby your business establishment/government agency was victimized by someone who trespassed (“broke into”) an office and did some property damage. The police caught the ones responsible, and you were informed that two teenagers were charged with burglary in a juvenile delinquency petition in court. You are contacted by a victim assistant (AG’s office) or by a juvenile probation officer or by the Inafa’ Maolek case manager about the possibility of participating in a face-to-face meeting with the youthful perpetrators. Your instinctive reaction is (“why would I want to meet with someone who ripped me off? Is this some warm fuzzy, do-gooder program trying to make us become friends? Is it a ploy to help out the offenders get a lighter sentence?

Victim-Offender dialogue, if it may occur at all, should be victim-driven and victim-focused while simultaneously being offender sensitive. While it occasionally happens that a victim chooses to participate to help “straighten out” an offender, most victims do so because of the benefits for themselves.

If you have ever been a victim of crime, perhaps you recall the gnawing questions with which you were left…even after the justice system has finished the case. Usually these questions can be answered only by the offender(s). These questions may include: “Why me?” (ie “was it personal?” “what were they after?”). “Will they come back and do it again?” “What happened to that heirloom (photo or whatever) that was apparently stolen?” Victim-Offender dialogue affords victims a safe space to ask (and get truthful answers to) these questions.

Another aspect of the crime which is important to most victims is restitution. Although courts can do order restitution it may require a court appearance and there is no guarantee the victim will ever see the money. Research shows that restitution is much more likely to be paid when it results from an agreement made in victim-offender dialogue then when it is court ordered. Moreover, many offenders (especially juvenile offenders) have virtually no money nor job. Victim-offender dialogue, however, allows for brainstorming creative alternative ways of doing restitution (e.g. direct services to the victim’s choice…whatever helps repair the harm while holding the offender directly accountable.

Victims are also in need of emotional satisfaction and closure. The opportunity given the victim in victim-offender dialogue to vent by telling their story (what it felt like to be victimized and naming/describing all the resulting harms) is a vital part of the victim’s healing journey. In the absence of such dialogue the victim may be left with some emotional scars from the crime (eg difficulty sleeping due to flashbacks or bad dreams, trouble trusting other people).

The offender listening to the victim’s account of the harms (which that offender caused directly or indirectly is often a most Transformative moment for causing said offender to change his/her thinking/behavior. Few offenders ever think about their victim in this victim-offender dialogue. The victim, then, is able to contribute toward a safer community by reducing the likelihood of recidivism by that offender.

Restorative Justice, the philosophy behind victim offender dialogue, views crime as harm to real people (not merely a crime against the Territory of Guam). The crime involves not only the victim and offender, but also the community which has suffered a rift in its _______ fabric. Inafa’ Maolek’s volunteer mediators are symbolic of the involvement of the community in righting the wrong. Restorative Justice can be used for all kinds of crimes, delinquent acts, student misconduct in schools and even sexual harassment in the workplace.