The main goals of restitution and community service programs are to hold offenders personally accountable for their crimes and to make reparations to victims either directly or indirectly. Over the past 25 years, restitution and community service programs have expanded considerably. A great deal of this growth resulted from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) and other Federal initiatives. In 1977, OJJDP launched a major restitution initiative by funding 85 new restitution programs. This was followed in 1983 by the National Restitution Training Program and in 1985 the Restitution Education, Specialized Training, and Technical Assistance (RESTTA) Project. The RESTTA National Directory of Restitution and Community Service Programs estimated recently that there were 547 community service and restitution programs nationwide (Schneider and Finkelstein, 1998).

There are three major types of restitution programs: community service, monetary restitution, and direct service to victims (Schneider and Finkelstein, 1998). Community service is work performed by an offender for the benefit of the community. It offers a way for the offender to be held accountable and to repair some of the harm caused by his or her criminal conduct. Monetary restitution is a process by which offenders are held partially or fully accountable for the financial losses suffered by the victims of their crimes. Restitution is typically ordered to compensate victims in cases of property crime, fraud, forgery, or theft. It may also be applied to reimburse victims of violent crime for expenses related to their physical and mental health recovery and to make up for loss of support for survivors of homicide victims (Schneider and Finkelstein, 1998). Direct service to victims is the rarest form of restitution. It is a type of reconciliation in which the offender and the victim meet in a carefully supervised setting to determine how the offender can make restitution directly to the victim by performing a service. These services usually include repairing property damaged by the offender or other services such as lawn mowing or snow removal. This type of personalized restitution incorporates the benefit of the victim being able to meet the offender, which often alleviates the fear associated with the criminal encounter (much like mediation programs to be discussed later).

In general, research suggests that restitution programs can lower recidivism. For example, a study of 6,336 formal juvenile probation cases in Utah found that juveniles agreeing to pay restitution as an informal disposition, as well as those formally ordered to pay restitution, returned to court significantly less often than juveniles who did not pay restitution (Butts and Snyder, 1992). In addition, Schneider and Schneider (1984) found that participants who completed their restitution requirements were significantly less likely to recidivate than participants who did not complete the requirements.

Schneider and Finkelstein (1998) found that one of the most important issues pertaining to the success of restitution and community service programs is the extent to which the program is considered a “formal” sanction. In general, a program is considered formal if it has a name, at least one full-time staff person solely responsible for enforcing restitution orders, and a written set of policies and procedures. Schneider and Finkelstein found a large difference in effectiveness between the use of restitution as a formal sanction and as an informal one. Further, the national evaluation of the Juvenile Restitution Initiative showed that formal restitution programs resulted in much higher completion rates and much lower recidivism than informal ones (Schneider and Schneider, 1984).

Finally, research also demonstrates that there are several obstacles that directly influence the ability to implement and manage a successful restitution program (Seymour, 1999). These obstacles include the belief among some justice professionals that all offenders are indigent and cannot afford to pay restitution; the fact that restitution orders often are not first in the priority of court-ordered payments and follow behind court costs, fines, salaries, costs of incarceration, and other financial obligations; the lack of interagency agreements stipulating who is responsible for monitoring, enforcing, collecting, and disbursing restitution; and cynicism of some crime victims and service providers about efforts to collect restitution.

References

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