Endnotes
1. (H.N. Snyder, personal communication, 2000.) Dr. Snyder provided these statistics, based on his analysis of 1999 arrest data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.
2. As used in this Bulletin, the term "child delinquents" refers to juveniles between the ages of 7 and 12 who have committed delinquent acts, as defined by criminal law. This group of juveniles is the focus of OJJDP's Study Group on Very Young Offenders.
3. (L.W. Sherman, personal communication, 1996.) The author and Professor Sherman collaborated on a grant proposal in the early stages of this project, and Sherman's thinking is reflected in this Bulletin.
4. A restorative justice program, however, should not force an offender to apologize to his or her victim. Nor should the victim be forced to accept an apology. An offender's apology should be sincere; it should not be viewed as a "quick fix" for the offender.
5. Research other than these two formal studies has reported declines in reoffending and high levels of victim satisfaction. This research, however, was not based on rigorous research designs. See Thames Valley Police, 1999; Braithwaite, 1999; Moore and O'Connell, 1994.
6. Restorative justice conferences are not fact-finding hearings. If a youth challenges the allegations, the matter should proceed to court. This criterion seeks to prevent the "revictimization" of a victim that could occur if the alleged offender failed to take responsibility for the act.
7. The sample size for the interviews was as follows: victims in conference group, n=42; victims in control group, n=50; youth in conference group, n=52; youth in control group, n=47; parents in conference group, n=52; and parents in control group, n=47.
8. Because control group victims were not asked if they felt they had been pushed around, this measure of perceived involvement and respect is not included in figure 2.
9. At the time of the comparison, program completion data were available for only 167 youth in the restorative conference group and 168 youth in the control group.
10. Chi-square statistically significant at <0.01. This level of significance indicates that a difference of the observed magnitude would only be expected to occur in 1 out of 100 samples.
11. Chi-square statistically significant at <0.05.
12. Chi-square statistically significant at <0.025.
13. Additionally, in later stages of the project, researchers will consider issues such as the length of time elapsing between program completion and rearrest and the seriousness of subsequent offending.
14. Analyses by subgroup at this stage
of the study are limited because sample
sizes at this stage become very small
when conference and control groups are
further divided by characteristics such as
offense, sex, and race. In the second stage
of the project, when sample sizes are larger,
researchers will carefully consider
whether the restorative conference approach
has different effects on different
categories of youth.
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