LOOKING INWARD
I have found the willingness of these men to be vulnerable, in an
environment where showing weakness can be extremely dangerous, profoundly moving. My last group was the youngest I have
worked with; most of them could have been my sons. For young
men, who have to prove their toughness in order to survive, opening up and talking about feelings can be especially difficult. After
the first circle with them, I feared this would be a very challenging group; they were silent, not even daring to really look at one
another. Some may still have been gang involved. Since they
weren’t responding to the typical “check-in” icebreaker, I started
by asking them how much time they had spent in prison and how
many years they had left to serve.
A soft spoken young Black man asked if his time at DYS
counted. (The Department of Youth Services is the state’s juvenile detention facility.) “Well then I guess I’ve been incarcerated
since I was twelve, and group homes before that.” His beautiful
smile highlighted the horror of what he was telling us, “I guess
you could say I grew up in prisons.” “And how many more years
do you have left?” “Oh, I’m doing life.” I looked around the room
at the bright young faces, now totally alert and interested, “How
many of you are doing life?” Half the room raised their hands.
I would soon find that this particular group of local young men
included some of the brightest, most eloquent I would ever
meet. Most of them come from ravaged urban environments
or marginalized rural communities, where lack of opportunity
becomes the breeding ground of alternative criminal economies. Many have family histories of incarceration, extreme
poverty, abuse, abandonment, and drug addiction. All these
young lifers are serving time for gang related murders; some
were the shooters but more were “accessories,” meaning they
were at the location, in the car, or somehow involved, but did not
themselves do the killing.
I was amazed as, one by one, the stories unfolded: memories of
mothers addicted to crack, family members shot, abusive group
homes, alcoholic fathers. A Cambodian man in his early twenties,
serving life without parole, tells us of his love and deep respect for
the father who immigrated to this country and worked every day
to be able to raise him and his brother on his own. His eyes fill with
tears when he says, “Now because of me, both of his sons are
incarcerated.” Another young man, who has been detained since
he turned eleven and is now serving a life sentence wrote, “As a
child I can remember hearing screaming, crying, things falling,
breaking…and then I would walk in to my dad beating my mother.
And of course I would try to help her, but my physical strength was
no match. And in the midst of it all, I would get hit. My sister would
be crying and screaming. When my parents split up, I felt lost and
unwanted. I felt like I was stripped down to nothing. I went from an
honor roll student to a troubled youth. And everything became a
snowball effect after that.”
MAKING AMENDS
During the “making amends” portion of the curriculum, the
dialogues move from storytelling to accountability. Once the
men have made the connection between their criminal behav-
ior and their own trauma and victimization, they are better
prepared for the next step: taking responsibility for the harm
they caused. Our “amend letter” exercise asks participants to
identify someone they have hurt and share that story in group
discussions, “I’m sorry Mom for everything. My being in prison
brought shame to the family and robbed you of your young-
est son. Even if it takes me forever, I will do whatever I have to
to be the son you always wanted me to be. I love you Ma. I’m
sorry.” Another writes to his daughter, “Now I’m a father with
a five-year-old girl, and starting to hurt her by not being there
for her, like a father should, when she needs me; so I’m reliving
my nightmare of failing as a successful son and now failing as a
father to a beautiful baby girl.”
While some participants write about family members, others
wish to undertake an exercise of repairing harm to their victims.
Although making amends to victims is rarely possible in a prison
context, participants are encouraged to “bring victims forward,”
in the words of survivor and restorative justice practitioner Janet
Connors, by making something of their own lives, repairing harm
in their own families and communities. These exercises bring
up powerful emotions in participants and allow them to express
feelings of anger, disappointment, remorse, and the desire for
forgiveness.
On the first day of one group, two men announced that they
had no remorse for their victims. Trusting that the process would
unearth other more complicated emotions, I left it alone. During
the last “making amends” exercise, while most of the participants wrote to their mothers, their children, or others who have
suffered because of their incarceration, I was surprised that
both of these men wrote to their victims. Both men apologized,
expressing profound remorse that the murders had caused devastation to their victim’s families.
How does that happen? That is the magic. It’s a journey the
men take on their own. The role of the facilitator is not to push participants but to listen with compassion and without judgement.
Many of the men have told me that they have never had a chance
to deeply reflect on and share their experiences with others. As
one incarcerated man eloquently said, “Restorative justice means
to take a walk into my pain and find out what caused it so I may
start to heal it and prevent it from happening again. “
Although making amends to victims is rarely
possible in a prison context, participants are
encouraged to “bring victims forward,” in
the words of survivor and restorative justice
practitioner Janet Connors, by making something
of their own lives, repairing harm in their own
families and communities.
