I’ve been waiting to tell you this news for some time. Today, Equal Justice USA officially welcomed the Restorative Justice Project onto our team.
Impact Justice, an ally organization in the justice movement, has been operating the Project, launched by the visionary sujatha baliga, since 2015. Impact Justice felt like now was the right time to spin it off. We feel honored to be the new home for their work. This growth — that your support makes possible — represents a milestone for us and I want to tell you why.
EJUSA started more than 20 years ago, primarily as an organization focused on repealing state death penalty laws, one at a time. Over the course of many successful campaigns, we met and partnered with countless survivors of violence and family members of murder victims.
One of the many important lessons we learned from them was that all of these people had experienced deep trauma in their lives, sometimes on multiple levels, and that much of the damage had gone unhealed. There was an undeniable connection between trauma and violence. This was a revelation.
So our founder, Shari Silberstein, led the effort to expand our mission. We built a vision for justice reimagined, and that vision would guide the creation of a new approach to justice that delivers healing, safety, and accountability that repairs for everyone. Our work would continue to reduce the harm of the current system while also building alternative strategies to violence that elevate healing over punishment. These strategies wouldn’t rely on policing, prosecutions, prison, and supervision — collectively responsible for immeasurable harm — but responses to violence that center those most impacted by it.
Restorative justice is a framework and process that starts with the needs of people who have been harmed, brings the impacted community together, and facilitates true accountability — acknowledgment, repair, and change that ensures harm will not be repeated. The Restorative Justice Project is a powerful healing pathway that completes our vision and will integrate exceptionally well with our current practice areas.
Cymone Fuller has led the Restorative Justice Project for the past three years, and we’re thrilled that she will continue to lead at EJUSA as a senior director. Several of us knew Cymone before we began talking about joining forces, and her values align perfectly with ours.
“During our time at Impact Justice, the Restorative Justice Project established an incredible national network of community and system partners committed to implementing restorative justice diversion,” said Cymone. “We’re excited to bring this network of partners, along with the body of knowledge, strategies, and tools we’ve developed together, to EJUSA and make EJUSA our long-term home for building a community-centered ecosystem of healing justice.
“Our team is confident and hopeful about all the opportunities we have to grow and strengthen our work at EJUSA,” continued Cymone. “We know we will be supported in our mission to seed and nurture community-held restorative justice practices that function as true alternatives to existing legal systems.”
Cymone is joined by four incredible teammates: Marcy Mistrett, director of restorative justice partnerships; Erica Washington, senior strategist, restorative justice; Karen Schousboe, senior training manager, restorative justice; and Jenna Kress, strategist, restorative justice. We are so excited for them to join our team.
The Project’s current structure is based on pre-charge diversion. This means that cases are referred to restorative justice programs with minimal to no involvement in the traditional court process. This model is an important offramp from a system solely focused on punishment. At EJUSA, the Restorative Justice Project will expand this strategy and build the groundwork for community-led referrals — addressing harm without involving the system at all. Engaging the community will expand the reach of restorative practices consistent with EJUSA’s community-centered approach to violence. From its inception, the Restorative Justice Project has centered the community, so it is well positioned to build and expand its reach with its new home at EJUSA.
I know that many of you may be new to the concept of restorative justice. I promise you that it can be as beautiful as it is effective. Studies of restorative justice have found that survivors of harm who participate in the process have a 91% satisfaction rate, eclipsing the rate of satisfaction with our current legal system.
I’m especially excited that the Project’s work has a substantial youth focus. Recent national data revealed that while overall violence rates went down in 2022, young people suffered higher rates of violence. They are especially vulnerable to trauma at that age, so this work feels even more timely.
Please take a few minutes to learn more about the Restorative Justice Project. But know that you will hear more from us, including deeper explanations of how restorative justice works, success stories, and more information about our stellar new teammates.
Thank you for continuing to be with us in this movement to build safer communities through healing and restoration rather than our current reliance on retribution and punishment.
