{"id":339794,"date":"2014-11-12T16:21:16","date_gmt":"2014-11-12T15:21:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/?page_id=8050"},"modified":"2014-11-12T16:21:16","modified_gmt":"2014-11-12T15:21:16","slug":"community-court-justice-corrective-in-practice","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/en\/projects\/projects-implemented\/community-court-justice-corrective-in-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Community Court – restorative justice in practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2013-2016, the Court Watch Poland Foundation participated in the implementation of the project entitled "Pilot implementation of the Community Court model in Poland as an institutional bridge between the judiciary, local authorities and social organizations facilitating the implementation of restorative justice in practice". This project was implemented through the National Centre for Research and Development under the "Social Innovation" programme (grant NO IS-1\/039), while the Foundation was a non-governmental partner in the consortium, also composed of three leading Polish universities: Nicolaus Copernicus University, University of Bialystok and University of Gdansk.<\/p>\n

The aim of the project was to develop and pilot innovative solutions in the field of judicial justice modelled on the Anglo-Saxon Com<\/i>munity Court model. The rationale for this social innovation is an inadequate system of punishment for minor offences, which results in a record population of prisoners and those awaiting imprisonment and the ineffectiveness of the judicial system for the rehabilitation of offenders, which suffers from their social environment as well as themselves.<\/p>\n

The project envisaged the establishment of Corrective Justice Centres in two Polish cities: Toru\u0144 and Bialystok. This objective has been achieved within the framework of the Centre for Restorative Justice projec<\/a>t.<\/p>\n

This model of cooperation between courts, prosecutors and probation services with an NGO is modeled on the community court model, which is widespread in the USA. In 2014, we had the opportunity to observe the practical functioning of this model during a study visit to the USA. An extensive account of this visit to Minneapolis and New York can be found her<\/b><\/a>e.<\/p>\n

Polish law allows creative adaptation of the model described above to our realities. Both the Minister of Justice and the Attorney-General signed on to the "Strategy for the modernisation of the area of justice in Poland for the period 2014-202<\/a>0", which (in Chap. VII, p. 16-17) describes the Community Court model and calls for the development and dissemination of this idea.<\/p>\n

We also recently wrote about the need for systemic action to promote the use of the principles of restorative justice in Gazeta Wyborcza<\/a>. In an article from dn. On October 17, 2014, we note that the widely commented case of Col. Olkowicz, the director of the Kosovar prison, who was convicted of paying bail for a mentally disabled prisoner, illustrates well the need to develop a systemic model for dealing with the perpetrators of minor crimes. We describe the community court model and advocate the possibility of its adaptation in Polish conditions:<\/p>\n

\n

This is an opportunity to develop solutions that will allow for more effective use of existing legislation so as to make the principles of restorative justice a reality in Poland as well. Where the institutions of justice open up to cooperation with the right social organisations, there is a good chance that the history of the "99 penny bar" will never happen again.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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In 2013-2016, the Court Watch Poland Foundation participated in the implementation of the project entitled "Pilot implementation of the Community Court model in Poland as an institutional bridge between the judiciary, local authorities and social organizations facilitating the implementation of restorative justice in practice". This project was implemented through the National Centre for Research and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":339785,"menu_order":83,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339794"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339794"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339794\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courtwatch.pl\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}