Joe has been the victim of two separate violent anti-gay hate crimes and what began as a personal healing response to the trauma, he has transformed into professional involvement in the field of community and restorative justice. In 2006, he began his work with the Institute for the Study and Practice of Nonviolence during a training of trainers in Kingian Nonviolence. Then in 2007, he served as a victim advocate on the Juvenile Restorative Justice Advisory Board for the Community Mediation Center of Rhode Island. In 2008, he attended the International Intensive Training on Nonviolent Communication with Marshall Rosenberg in Albuquerque, NM. From 2010 until 2014, Joe was the associate director of a community mediation center in Connecticut where he oversaw juvenile and adult criminal mediation/dialogue programs that involved victim/offender and offender/offender dialogues. Also, in this role, he supported school-based mediation programs, mediation for the Juvenile Review Boards in Hamden and New Haven, Connecticut, and provided hundreds of trainings in Nonviolent Communication.

Restorative-Practice-Looks-Like-2018.pdf