NCJ Number
148753
Editor(s)
L M Muntingh,
R Shapiro
Date Published
1994
Length
69 pages
Annotation
This booklet describes diversionary options available to the South African criminal justice system through the National Institute for Crime Prevention and the Rehabilitation of Offenders (NICRO).
Abstract
Three diversionary options are currently offered: victim offender mediation, pretrial community service, and a youth offender program. These creative diversionary options aim to channel prima facie cases from the formal criminal justice system, under certain circumstances, to extrajudicial programs at the discretion of the prosecution. The objectives of diversion are to make offenders responsible for their actions, to provide an opportunity for reparation, to identify underlying problems motivating criminal behavior, to prevent offenders from receiving a criminal record after one offense, to open up the judicial process for educational and rehabilitative procedures, and to reduce the criminal justice system case load. NICRO's three diversionary tactics are rooted in the paradigm of restorative, as opposed to retributive, justice.