Offender’s family, victim provide
motivation for positive change

Maurice’s 11-year-old daughter Samantha was living with her mother 85 miles away when he was contacted about Samantha being charged with theft from a motor vehicle.

“I was totally surprised,” Maurice explained. “We had never had any problems with Samantha.”

When Lutheran Social Services Restorative Justice Facilitator Barb Mayer received this referral from the Juvenile Court, she realized that being only 11 years old, Samantha would probably be frightened about the process and have no idea what to expect. So when she held her pre-meeting with Samantha and her parents, Barb thoroughly explained how Accountability Conferencing works and went through each step in the process.

“My daughter was scared at first,” Maurice recalled, “but the more she spoke with Barb and understood how things would go, she became more positive about it.”

Theft from a motor vehicle
The incident was discovered in May 2010, when the victim, 18-year-old Dennis, returned to his car in the parking lot following a baseball game.

“I walked up and saw my senior pictures all scattered around on the ground,” he said. “Then I noticed my cell phone and wallet that I’d left in the car were missing, along with credit cards.”

Police found the suspect quickly because Samantha had tried to use a credit card.

“I felt like an idiot because of getting my stuff stolen,” Dennis reported. “And my friends whose numbers were on my cell phone got calls from her and they were mad about losing their privacy.”

At first when Facilitator Barb Mayer contacted Dennis about participating in an Accountability Conference with Samantha, he didn’t want to take up more of his time to deal with a situation he wanted to forget about.

“But then Barb met with me and explained how the face-to-face meeting with the offender in the conference could really help me put some closure to the incident and also help the girl deal with what she had done, so I decided to go ahead,” Dennis said.

Why?
As is often the case, Samantha had no explanation as to why she stole the items from Dennis’ vehicle.

“She was getting good grades and had just received an award for having perfect attendance for the whole school year,” Maurice said.

At the Accountability Conference, Dennis explained how his trust in people was damaged because of this incident and that he also learned a valuable lesson to always lock his car doors.

“I could tell at the conference that she was really sorry,” Dennis said, “and both her parents apologized numerous times. The first thing she did when she saw me was hand me $5 that she said was from her birthday money as her first restitution payment.”

Samantha had written an apology letter to Dennis as well as personally apologizing at the conference, and got a little emotional, according to Maurice.

“Dennis showed his appreciation for her sincerity, and at the end, they hugged each other,” he recalled.

Part of the Accountability Agreement signed at the conference between Samantha, her parents and Dennis was for Samantha to pay total restitution of $100, which she did.

“She paid off the fine by using half of the $20 a week that she got for helping out around the house,” Maurice explained.

Smoothing out a scary prospect
Maurice said that he knew just how scary the legal process can be from personal experience seeing police officers arrest his parents when he was a child and that he didn’t want his daughter to be frightened like that.

“But as an adult, I’ve also worked in law enforcement, so I understand both sides,” he said.

“Barb handled this whole process so beautifully and was very sensitive to Samantha’s young age,” he added. “I’m very impressed that she was able to get this done without scaring my little girl and in a very professional manner. She put us at ease and made us feel comfortable with the process that was difficult but all for the best.”

Samantha enrolled in a new school this fall and currently lives with her father.

“Today was her first day on the basketball team, and she also made the honor roll and is going for perfect attendance again,” Maurice said. “Samantha is really headed in the right direction now.”

Not only that, but at her fall parent-teacher conference, all her teachers and even the principal were thanking Maurice for enrolling Samantha in their school.

The victim, Dennis, said he felt the Accountability Conferencing program should be used even more.

“You get to actually tell the person who committed the crime how you felt, and you get to know that they really feel bad for what they’ve done and that they won’t do it again,” he said. “That’s so helpful for everybody involved.”

Maurice said this experience was the first he’d heard about Lutheran Social Services offering the Accountability Conferencing program as an alternative to court proceedings for young offenders.

“I just want to recommend this program,” he said. “I also want to say a big thank you to the people who support Lutheran Social Services for making this program possible and to the Juvenile Court for allowing Lutheran Social Services to work with our family.”