Referring Cases to Victim Offender-Mediation in Finland – the Role of the

Police and Prosecutor

European best practices of restorative justice in the criminal procedure

27-29.4.2009 Budapest

Aarne KinnunenSaija Järvinen

The history of VOM in Finland

- The first experiments started in the beginning of the 1980’s

- Grassroots-level bottom-up approach

- Volunteer mediators

- Emphasis on social work and on youth work

Background of VOM in Finland

- Municipalities organised mediation services in various ways - i.e. some municipalities set up a mediation

office of their own, some outsourced the service to another municipality or organisation

- No state supervision- The VOM practices varied throughout the

country and guidance and supervision by state authorities was minimal

Background of VOM in Finland

• Act on Mediation in Criminal and Certain Civil Cases (1015/2005) came into force on 1st January 2006

• The legislation aims to safeguard sufficient government funding for mediation services, to organize their national management, supervision and monitoring, and to create conditions for their long-term evaluation and development

The Act on Mediation in Criminal and Certain Civil Cases (1015/2005)

• Additionally the Act aims to make the procedures followed in mediation more uniform and to give proper attention to the legal protection of the parties in the mediation process

• Use of volunteer mediators continues

The Act on Mediation in Criminal and Certain Civil Cases (1015/2005)

- The legislation is only loosely connected to the criminal justice system

- Loose structure in the legislation concerning e.g. what type of cases can be mediated

• The law merely states that mediation may deal with crimes that are assessed as eligible for conciliation, taking into account the nature and method of the offence, the relationship between the suspect and the victim and other issues related to the crime as a whole

• Mediation offices are trusted in their code of conduct the challenge is still to make the practices equal in

different provinces

●Vantaa●Porvoo

●Vihti

●Sodankylä

●Ylivieska

●Pudasjärvi

●Järvenpää

25 mediation offices in total → there are about 90-100 mediation coordinators

or advisors working as recruited staff members.

The number of volunteer mediators is currently

about 1 000

Ahvenanmaa

Statistics on VOM

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

Finland South West East Oulu Lapland Aland

All cases

Intimate relationshipviolence cases

Types of cases referred to mediation 1.6.-31.12. 2006

(N=2 814)

41

20

14

8

8

5

4

0 10 20 30 40 50

Violence crimes

Damages

Thefts

Domestic violence

Others

Slander

disturbance of domestic peace

%

Imbalance in resources

- Resources- 6.3 million € annual budget- 5 civil servants in State Provincial Offices- 20 000 € for further training

• The allocation of resources has been inflexible

Referring cases to VOM

• The initiative for mediation can in principal come from the parties themselves, social workers, teachers, police, prosecutors etc.

• The role of the parties has since the beginning been minor

• The role of the police and prosecutors has always been crucial

• Training with the police and prosecutors• The practices and amount of referrals coming

from the police and prosecutors varies in different parts of Finland

Referring cases to VOM

• In 2007 nearly 6 800 case initiatives were made out of which – 70 % came from the police, – 24 % from the prosecutors and– 6 % came elsewhere such as from the parties

themselves or social workers

Violence in intimate relationships makes an exception

• There has been far-reaching discussion in Finland as to whether domestic violence cases should be mediated at all

• Consequently several restrictions have been proposed when it comes to the mediation of domestic violence

• These include cases where the violence is recurring or the parties have already before been through mediation dealing with domestic violence

Violence in intimate relationships makes an exception

• Neither are such cases eligible for mediation if the offender's attitude to the offence or the relationship between the offender and the victim otherwise indicates that the offender regards use of violence as an acceptable way of dealing with the problems within the relationship

• In the incidence of intimate relationship violence mediation is allowed only in cases referred by the police or the prosecutor

Violence in intimate relationships makes an exception

• As a consequence the question of whose responsibility it is to examine the suitability of the case needs to be addressed

• E.g. reoccurrence of violence can be difficult to indicate• For the police officers and prosecutors directing the

cases to mediation does not seem to involve much consideration of the suitability of the case or examination of the underlying situation (Metsäpelto, 2008; Mielityinen, 1999).

• This is seen as the job for the mediation office. However the mediation offices do not have access to the needed documents due to secrecy regulations and thus cannot base their decision on underlying facts

Assessment of the suitability of intimate relationship violence to VOM

• According to the Legal Affairs Committee (see report LaVM 13/2005) police officers and prosecutors should, prior to sending an intimate relationship violence case to mediation, be in contact with the social services in order to better evaluate the appropriateness of the case to be referred to mediation

• However a study is being conducted and the preliminary results suggest that this suffers from consistency issues

Conclusion

• A new phase in VOM after the new legislation in 2006

• General satisfaction: now good possibility to work

• Need for professionalism, ensuring legal safe guards for all parties

• Mediation should not loose innovativeness, its grassroots level approach

• Need for stricter governmental level coordination

Conclusion

• When it comes to the mediation of intimate relationship violence additional rules and regulations apply– Firstly the initiative must come either from a prosecutor or from a

police officer. Parties in conflict thus cannot take the case directly to mediation by themselves and it is additionally recommended that the case is first evaluated by social workers

– Secondly, the mediators must have received further training in order to be part in domestic violence mediation

– Thirdly, several limitations concerning the offence and the parties in conflict hinder the possibility of the case to be handled in mediation

• Co-operation is essential