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New Zealand

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New Zealand Faith-based Unit impacted by Lockdown

In late 2007, the New Zealand Department of Corrections implemented an extended time of lockdown for prisoners due to various staffing and budget constraints. In many prisons, including Rimutaka Prison housing the PF New Zealand Faith-based Unit, prisoners are locked in their cells from 5:00pm until 8:00am. While posing challenges to the activities of PF New Zealand volunteers in all programmes, the new lockdown policy offers unique problems for the faith-based unit.

He Korowai Whakapono – Annual Report – October 2005 – June 2007

Report from the PF New Zealand faith-based Unit He Korowai Whakapono after 3 years and 8 months of operation.

Restorative Reintegration - A New Approach to Prisoner Aftercare in New Zealand

There are around 8000 prisoners currently in the prison system. There will be a further 1000 prisoners in the system by 2011. Around 9000 prisoners are released from prison each year. About 50% of all released prisoners will receive a Corrections reintegration plan on leaving. The remaining 4,500 will get their $350 and a bus ticket. The first 3 – 6 months is the crucial period for released prisoners. Many prisoners walk out of prison, determined to make a new start. The first 3 – 6 months are critical. They need help with housing, employment, debt management, and family and community relationships. If they get help from mentors and the community in the first six months, the chance of them reoffending drops by around 40%. If they face barriers, red tape, and stigmatization, it becomes difficult to keep on the straight and narrow. That is where Prison Fellowship comes in. Over the last four years, Prison Fellowship has developed a holistic approach to prisoner reintegration known as “Restorative Reintegration”

Focus on Prisoner Reintegration

The PF New Zealand 2007 annual conference, When Prisoners Come Home… A Community Response to Prisoner Reintegration, highlighted the many issues surrounding a prisoner’s release from prison.

Rethinking Crime and Punishment

It’s a burgeoning problem that many may not even be aware of. The imprisonment rate in New Zealand has reached epidemic proportions—it is 164 per 100,000, double what it was in 1980 and now one of the highest in the world. The New Zealand Department of Corrections estimates that it costs $161.91 (NZD) per day for each prisoner, so the added prisoners result in an extra $141 million per year. And imprisonment does not seem to be changing the criminal behaviour of prisoners because 60 percent of all released prisoners re-offend within two years. As is the case in many countries, the issues surrounding crime and punishment are demanding new solutions.

Advocating for Victims’ Rights in New Zealand

On September 7, PF New Zealand representatives addressed the New Zealand Justice and Electoral Committee Inquiry into Victims Rights. The PF NZ team recommended that the government strengthen victims’ access to victim offender conferencing and victim offender panels.

New Zealanders Visit Europe to Explore Possible Prison Reforms

From 30 January to 7 February, PF New Zealand executive director Kim Workman joined a governmental team on a fact finding trip to visit prisons in the UK, Finland, and the Netherlands. Organized by the New Zealand Minister of Corrections, the fact-finding team spoke with government and corrections officials, prison reformers, and community providers exploring alternative offender management models.

Prison as a Place of Restoration

PF New Zealand has developed a programme bringing victims face-to-face with their offenders. Generally taking place in the prison setting, these safely-structured and facilitated meetings provide victims with the opportunity to tell their story and ask questions of their offenders. Offenders chance to learn how their crime truly impacted the victim and to express remorse for their behaviour. The following story illustrates the potential of victim-offender encounters to create a space for healing.

Evaluating the Sycamore Tree Project®

In November 2005, Prison Fellowship New Zealand released a new evaluation of the effectiveness of the Sycamore Tree Project® (STP).

Sycamore Tree Project Impact Evaluation for Prison Fellowship New Zealand

Forty nine offenders completed an attitude to offending measure (CRIME_PICS II) before and after the Sycamore Tree programme showed significant changes on all scales in the expected direction. While the reduction in victim empathy was not as great as might be expected the changes were nevertheless significant.

Prison Fellowship of New Zealand: Sycamore Tree

Paper presented at the Just Peace? Peace Making and Peace Building for the New Millennium conference, held in Auckland, New Zealand, 24-28 April. Auckland, New Zealand: Massey University, School of Social and Cultural Studies, Centre for Justice and Peace Development.

No Future without Forgiveness: The practice of Victim-Offender Reconciliation in NZ

In my presentation today I will speak about PFNZ’s work in prisons that focus on programmes and processes that address restorative justice values and principles.

A Consideration of the Sycamore Tree Programme and Survey Results from the Perspective of a Restorative Justice Practitioner

The Sycamore Tree Programme (STP), delivered by Prison Fellowship of New Zealand, is a restorative justice programme which brings together a panel of six inmates and six crime victims over eight two-hour sessions. The victims attending these meetings are not the particular victims of the inmates. The programme includes large and small group discussions, victim/offender interactions, role-plays, and readings that create a contemporary retelling of the biblical story of Zaccheus, a man who admits to his offending and sets about to restore to his victims what he has defrauded them of.

Resolving Conflict and Restoring Relationships: Experiments in Community Justice within a New Zealand Faith-Based Unit

In October 2004, a faith-based prison unit was opened at Rimutaka Prison, near Wellington, New Zealand, being a joint Department of Corrections and Prison Fellowship of New Zealand programme that promotes peace and reconciliation. The model of biblical peace making, and processes for 'conflict resolution and the restoration of community peace, presents both staff and inmates with conflicts in terms of established disciplinary procedures, and the impact of 'prisonisation' on inmates. The introduction of a victim-offender program (the Sycamore Tree program) further reinforces the consequences of crime and the harm to victims. The paper explores the role of restorative justice in prisons, and the applicability of "best practise" restorative justice principles and practises within an institutional setting. It also examines the implications of this model for inmate family/whänau restoration, and victim/offender reconciliation. The paper concludes with a discussion on the implications of this model for the wider correctional system.

Community Of Restoration Brochure

A guide to the faith-based unit in Rimutaka Prison.

Sycamore Tree Success

A restorative justice programme involving face-to-face meetings between prison inmates and victims of crime is proving so successful it is to be expanded into eight prisons around the country this year.

Murder in the Faith-Based Unit

At 10.30am, Thursday, 4th April a profound event occurred in the faith based unit at Rimutaka Prison, which shook both staff and inmates to the core. It was at that time that an inmate was found dead, with a garden fork through his throat.

Faith-based Prisons: An Innovative Path Towards Offender Rehabilitation

‘He Korowai Whakapono’, the faith-based prison unit at Rimutaka Prison, provides inmates with a Christian programme emphasizing spirituality and moral development, with the aim of rehabilitation and reduced re-offending.

Sycamore Tree Programme: A Journey For Them All

PRison Fellowship New Zealand is actively workign with the Department of Corrections to expand the Sycamore Tree Project. This article originally appeared in Te Ara Whakatika: newsletter of the court-referred restorative justice project, Winter 2004, number 22.

PF New Zealand – The first Sycamore Tree Project® in the Faith Based Unit

Five victims of crime and five offenders took part in this inaugural STP in the Faith Based Unit. PFNZ staff member Jackie Katounas ran the programme along with David and Karina TeHira who will run subsequent STP at Rimutaka Prison. I have attended quite a number of STP Celebration events and I hear similar things comings from both offenders and victims. Let me share with you some of the comments that were shared with the assembled guests at the FBU this morning.