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Sylvia Clute, Attorney, Author of Beyond Vengeance, Beyond Duality

RESTORATIVE & UNITIVE JUSTICE TUESDAY, MARCH
Sylvia Clute, Attorney, Author of Beyond Vengeance, Beyond Duality and one of the world's foremost advocates and practitioners of "Unitive Justice"

Sylvia Clute is a former trial attorney and holds an M.A. in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, a Juris Doctor from Boston University School of Law, and an M.A. in Public Administration from the University of California at

Click for info and to purchase. Highly Recommended!

Berkeley. After graduating from law school and establishing a practice, Clute co-founded the only women's bank in the South, became chairman of the board, and helped move Virginia's laws relating to women and children into the twentieth century. She is currently Program Coordinator of a restorative school program and serves on the board of Restorative Youth Services of Virginia, and her recent book, Beyond Vengeance, Beyond Duality: A Call for a Compassionate Revolution has received profound and significant praise and exposure as mapping a new territory for systemic change in criminal justice and beyond--in how we heal ourselves, our communities, and our world.

More about Sylvia and her work: www.sylviaclute.com

KENNY JOHNSON, AUTHOR: The Last Hustle, FORMER PRISONER, FOUNDER: THIS SACRED SPACE
Thursday, March 22nd 5pm PST/8pmEST

Kenny Johnson devoted his life to crime, beginning in his early teens and served over twenty years in various city, county, state, and federal prisons.
During his early years in prison, he spent most of his time participating in all sorts of religious and substance abuse groups. Hopefully, in one of these groups he would hear the magic words that would release him from the grip of his inner and outer prisons. It was his inner desire for freedom that led him and a band of truth-seekers to a meeting in the prison chapel. Antoinette Varner, his spiritual teacher answered his most pressing question.

"It is my understanding that we have to wait until we die before we can receive God's Grace. Is that so?" She replied, "Kenny, God's Grace is here now! Kenny you think you are a convict, you think you are your name, you think you are a black man. Kenny you are none of these things."
Instantly he knew he would never be a thief again. But how do you re-enter the world outside without resorting to old weaknesses? How would he survive and how would it be possible to maintain his newly found experience of grace?
"This ever present Grace supports me in each moment now."

Paroled from prison in 1997 and successfully discharged from supervision, Kenny now resides in California. He visits inmates at the San Quentin Prison, and around the world. Kenny has founded This Sacred Space a non-profit corporation dedicated to sharing the timeless message that real freedom resides within each one of us.

"If there is anything worth serving, it's this love. If there is anything worth being, it's this love. If there is anything worth talking about it's this love. If there is anything of real value it's this love". - Kenny Johnson

The Last Hustle
Kenny Johnson is the author of the book “The Last Hustle” chronicling his years as a criminal and how he was transformed while incarcerated. His story proves that however hard and unpromising our particular life circumstances, we can discover true happiness.

He speaks of this freedom at correctional facilities the world over. His story is an inspiration to hundreds of others.
For thirty-one years Kenny Johnson’s most fervent desire was to hear his name ‘ringing in the streets’ as a hustler, thief, and pimp. Running parallel with that desire was a persistent seed of spiritual longing that would not leave him alone.
Kenny was arrested thirty-seven times and spent much of his life in prison, or on the run. Each time behind bars sent him into a deep and profound despair. Eventually his desire for lasting freedom would drive him to find a power that could not only get him through his final sentence, but free him from prison forever.
“I had to find a power that would not only get me through my current sentence, but would free me from prison forever.”

Dominic Barter has studied the interface between societal and personal change, and the role of conflict, since the 1980s. Since 2004 he has worked as consultant and training program director for the Brazilian Restorative Justice pilot projects, in collaboration with the UN Development Program, UNESCO, the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Education and Special Secretariat for Human Rights. He has focused on developing effective models and training programs for practitioners to address youth crime and its consequences, as well as working with judges, school administrators, police, social services as well as youth and community leaders in supervising implementation. Dominic coordinates the Restorative Justice Project for the international Center for Nonviolent Communication.

www.restorativecircles.org
Follow on Twitter: @restoracircles

A Restorative Circle is a community process for supporting those in conflict.

As developed in the favelas of Brazil in the mid 1990s, where it later became known as Círculos Restaurativos, it brings together the three parties to a conflict - those who have acted, those directly impacted and the wider community - within a chosen systemic context, to dialogue as equals. Participants invite each other and attend voluntarily. The dialogue process used is shared openly with all participants. The process ends when actions have been found that bring mutual benefit that nurtures the inherent integrity of all those involved in the conflict.

Círculos Restaurativos are facilitated in 3 stages that arise in an approximate sequence and identity the key factors in the conflict, reach agreements on next steps, and evaluate the results. As a circle form, they invite shared power, mutual understanding and self-responsibility within community.

Círculos Restaurativos are facilitated by community members who identify themselves as impacted by the conflict at hand. They commit to serving the emergent wisdom of the participants through their willingness to offer questions sourced from an agreed upon basis and to track the co-creation of meaning and intra-personal, inter-personal and social action by those present.

Restorative Systems Videos: http://www.restorativecircles.org/systems-and-facilitation

How a small group of people have made extensive change in Canada and Worldwide towards Peace & Restorative Justice

Very special guests Penny Joy & Saul Arbess of Restorative Circles and the Canadian Dept. of Peace Initiative

In her own words...Penny Joy

Born in England in the Blitz, I think perhaps my whole life has been directed into a spiraling path of exploration into peace.

Growing up in Malta, Sri Lanka, Germany, working in England and Spain engendered a love of travel, people and stories. Repertory theatre work in England morphed into a decade of creative work with BBC TV. My first experience of Canada, came through living, with my first son, in a commune on the land of the Penelakut people on BC's Gulf Islands. It was there that I first gained knowledge of First Nations stories. A journey to Africa followed, which included an overland expedition from S. Sudan to Kenya through many tribal areas.

Returning to Canada to become a citizen, I pursued documentary film work in Vancouver, where I acquired a BA in Community and Communications from Antioch University. I met and was deeply impacted by Jean Houston, with whom I continue to study. She became godmother to my second child who was born in Victoria where I started a documentary film and TV production company Gumboot Productions. This resulted in the production, direction and writing of documentary programs that included The Spiritual Roots of Restorative Justice and The Art of Compassion. www.gumboot.net

Through interest in First Nations and justice issues I joined the Restorative Justice Coalition at William Head Penitentiary and co-founded the Victoria Restorative Justice Society, where I am a facilitator of Restorative Justice circles, taking referrals from Victoria Police Department and Attorney General. I also co-founded the Victoria chapter of the Canadian Department of Peace Initiative www.departmentofpeace.ca in 2003 and co-convened the 2nd Summit of the Global Alliance for Ministries and Departments of Peace held in Victoria in 2006, in which 18 countries participated.

Saul Arbess, Ph.D.

Cultural anthropologist and futurist dedicated to creating a new architecture of peace in the world. His activism is devoted to building a culture of peace in Canada and abroad, in which restorative practices are at its heart. Has worked with Jean Houston for over 30 years and been trained in Nonviolent Communication NVC)

National Co-chair, Canadian Department of Peace Initiative ( 2005-2011). We are working in concert with other countries including the US, Australia, South Africa and Japan to form departments of peace in all nations. There are 12 chapters across Canada. Co-founder, and Chair, Global Alliance for Ministries and Departments of Peace (2005-2011), representing 30 plus country initiatives and 3 countries with Ministries of Peace.Currently working on my home town, Victoria, becoming a city of peace and non-violence and protecting the wildlands surrounding our city.

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