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Justice that heals
By Robin Graham
Photography by Dan Johnson
In 1984, the Irish Republican Army bombed the Grand Hotel in Brighton, England. Although Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was among those who escaped, Sir Anthony Berry, treasurer of Britain’s royal household, was killed in the blast, along with four others.
In November 2006, Jo Berry, his daughter, sat shoulder to shoulder next to Patrick
Magee, the IRA activist who placed and detonated the bomb that killed her father. The
two were being broadcast live via satellite from Dublin, Ireland, to Marquette University's International Restorative Justice Conference in Milwaukee.
 The conference, the first of its kind in the world, brought together unlikely companions like Berry and Magee, as well as four others: Linda Biehl, mother of Fulbright Student Scholar Amy Biehl, and Ntobeko Peni, one of the men who murdered Amy; and Robi Damelin, an Israeli who lost her son to Palestinian sniper fire, and Ali Abu Awwad, a Palestinian whose brother was killed by Israeli soldiers.
An international movement that began rising to prominence in the 1970s, restorative justice is a theory of criminal justice that gives crime victims — whether international or local — the opportunity to dialogue with offenders in an effort to move beyond their anger and pain.
Often this process reveals two sides of the same story. Not only do victims of crime get to say, “What you did affects me,” but also, those responsible get to tell about what was on their minds when they committed their crimes.
That’s the point at which something unexpected can happen: understanding.
And that’s when the healing begins.
Their stories
The three pairs of guest speakers at Marquette’s daylong International Restorative Justice Conference were there to tell how they, despite being on opposite sides of crime, came to understand each other. More than 300 people from around the United States, representing faith, community and academic contingencies, crowded into Marquette’s Alumni Memorial Union Ballroom to hear their stories.
Jo and Patrick
Patrick Magee was sentenced to 35 years in prison for the Brighton bombing that killed Jo Berry’s father. Fourteen years into his sentence, Magee was freed per the terms of the Good Friday Agreement, signed in 1998 by British and Irish leaders to promote peace in Northern Ireland. The Unionist party, which Jo Berry had supported, opposed the agreement.
 While Magee was in prison, Berry was dealing with her own intense pain over what had happened. But after a chance cab ride with a man whose brother, a member of the IRA, was killed by the British, she realized she needed to give up blame.
“He told me, ‘We can build a bridge across the divide,’” Berry said.
She went to Ireland and became involved with Republican and victim groups. And she decided she wanted to meet Magee. It was difficult at first, but they talked and soon started seeing things from each other’s perspectives.
“After Northern Ireland was partitioned in 1920, its people had no power or adequate representation,” said Magee. “It was against the will of the people, and a terrible political injustice. I joined the IRA because of this denial of rights.”
As the two met another seven or so times, Berry began to see Magee as a human being. “If I had lived Pat’s life, I might have made the same choices,” she said. “Everyone was acting the best way they knew how. People’s voices need to be heard. But we need to find a way to resolve conflict without bombs.”
Magee agreed: “I did not consider the person wearing the British uniform. I was making the same mistakes I thought the enemy was.”
Linda and Ntobeko
In August 1993, American Fulbright student Amy Biehl was stabbed and beaten to death by a group of men living in apartheid South Africa. Blonde and blue-eyed Biehl, who was working in the black townships of South Africa, was targeted as a symbol of their white oppressors.
Six weeks later, at the invitation of the African National Congress, Amy’s parents Peter and Linda were on a plane to South Africa.
“We felt that going there was the best way to show love and support for our daughter,” said Linda Biehl. “We also wanted to support South Africa in its [quest] for freedom.”
Three years after entering prison all four of the men charged with Amy’s murder were eligible to apply for amnesty, made possible by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission led by Bishop Desmond Tutu. One of them was Ntobeko Peni, considered the leader of the attack.
“Life was very difficult for us,” he said. “Our comrades were shot and killed daily. We were ready to kill and die for the cause [of freedom].”
Peni first saw the Biehls at the second hearing for the crimes he was charged with committing. “They spoke at the hearing,” he said, “and said they had forgiven us. It broke me apart.”
After being released Peni wanted to leave his past behind. The Biehls offered him a position at the foundation they’d started to carry on their daughter’s human rights work: The Amy Biehl Foundation (www.amybiehl.org), whose focus is providing opportunities and development to South Africa’s disenfranchised youth.
After her daughter died, “my pain spurred me on to stepping into a bigger role,” Biehl said. “Now I have [gone from] being mother to Amy to being a mother in a different land. And as you raise children, you raise consciousness.”
Robi and Ali
Robi Damelin’s son, David, was a student at Tel Aviv University and part of the peace movement in Israel. When he was called up to the reserves, David didn’t hesitate to do his part.
Doing so cost him his life. Trying to make sense of it all, Damelin wrote a letter to the sniper who killed her son. But it didn’t end her pain.
“I started looking at ways for Israeli and Palestinian families to avoid [going through what I went through],” Damelin said. “We needed to end the cycle of pain and violence. A nonviolent solution is the only way for both nations to live in peace.”
Palestinian Ali Abu Awwad was reeling from the death of his brother, who had been killed by Israeli soldiers. Awwad himself had been shot by Israelis and imprisoned for resisting the Israeli occupation.
Of his brother’s death, Awwad said, “When this happens, you are broken into a million pieces. The easiest way to deal with the anger is to throw it to the other side. But causing pain is not making mine any less. So rather than carry the bitterness of [losing] my brother, I decided to carry the role of peacemaker.”
Awwad agreed with Damelin that nonviolence is the only way. “Otherwise, we will keep dying,” he said, “and we don’t want to die in this way. But one small light cannot get rid of darkness.”
That’s why Awwad and his family joined The Parents Circle – Bereaved Families Forum, which brings together Israeli and Palestinian families who have lost loved ones to political violence in the Middle East. Damelin joined the organization after her son died.
The two met and are now spreading their message of nonviolent resistance throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel. They both are also subjects of the 2006 documentary film Encounter Point.
Restorative justice at Marquette
Although nonviolent, restorative justice is not always easy. It is a slow process; results sometimes come only after years. And participants on both sides experience complex feelings. Awwad doesn’t necessarily think he has to like Israelis to promote peace among them. And a part of Jo Berry will never recover from her father’s death. “I’m not saying it’s all sorted,” she told the Marquette audience. “There’s anger, but there’s also healing.”
It is the healing that makes restorative justice especially attractive to Marquette University Law School, the first law school in the United States with a significant program. “Our restorative justice program helps students learn and develop the unusual ability that lawyers can have to bring people together,” says Joseph Kearney, Law School dean and professor.
Janine Geske, former Wisconsin Supreme Court judge and distinguished professor of law at the Law School, believes that the timing is right for restorative justice.
“People don’t sit and talk anymore,” she says. “Dialogue is at the heart of the restorative justice process. It creates incredible understanding.”
And it creates good lawyers. Because restorative justice does not require a license to practice, law students can get immediate hands-on experience and begin developing dialogue and listening skills.
“Lawyers are often seen as fighters,” says Geske. “Through the restorative justice process, they can also be seen as healers.”
This fall, the Marquette University National Restorative Justice Conference will feature “Violence in Milwaukee.”
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