Tagging and Restorative Justice

A recent story caught my eye. According to the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles tagger Cyrus Yazdani, who goes by Buket, has been sentenced to 3 years and 8 months for his tagging efforts.

This is not the first time this notorious tagger has been caught and fined. Yazdani, a 26-year old college graduate from San Jose State, is a prolific tagger who does his tagging in broad daylight. The amount of damage caused by Yazdani's graffiti is in the range of $150,000. And that's got to be on the low side. Most of the damage has been done in Los Angeles; authorities say he's tagged hundreds of freeway overpasses. Is this a fair and just sentence? What do you do with a serial tagger? How would a justice system based on the principles of restorative justice see this case?

Restorative justice is a new vision for the criminal justice system that has taken hold in the U.S. and around the world. Restorative justice starts with the assumption that the existing criminal justice system is flawed, and broken. These principles acknowledge that crime is a crime against real human beings, not the state which is how we process crime in the U.S.  Restorative justice encourages direct offender accountability by seeking to restore the victim(s) as much as possible. This would include requiring that the offender take steps to make things right with the victim(s), and the community where the crimes occurred.

In this case, the fact that Yazdani was caught and fined previously (and ordered to pay restitution, something that would reflect restorative justice principles) seems to have made no impact on his tagging. t It's hard to argue that a sentence of three years and eight months iwill change Yazdani's behavior. Since prison time will cost the state $48,000 a year, Yazdani's sentence will add up to a little over than $168,000 to keep him behind bars. This time will do nothing to restore the victims impacted by his crimes.  The victims include the public, the community, and those who own the property that Yazdani tagged.

Restorative justice would agree with the assessing of fines, but would want to make sure that the restitution goes directly to the victim as much as possible. The offender should know the impact his crime has had. The first time this man was arrested he should have faced his victims (ex. employers of local businesses, county and city representatives/authorities tasked with removing graffiti,  etc.). This process is called  victim offender mediation or victim offender dialogue. Sometimes this process is part of a sentence given to an offender allowing for one on one contact between victim and offender. Sometimes there are "circles" where family members of the offender and victim are present. The purpose of these meetings is to hold the offender accountable and encourage that responsibility is taken for a crime. The offender learns the effect his actions had on his victims. Often at the end of the dialogue a contract is agreed upon which spells out steps the offender agrees to take to make things right while discussing the offender’s commitment to stay crime free in the future.

Make any difference? You might think it does not. You’d be wrong. I have worked with victims of violent crime and violent offenders for many years. The last thing an offender wants to do is to face his victims. Increasingly this approach is working not only with nonviolent offenders, but with violent offenders inside prison and those being released. Putting a human face on a "victim" is critical for the offender to understand the injury he has caused.

In this case, perhaps it would have made no difference. But I would think early on that if this tagger had seen the impact of his crimes and been required to sit down and face a roomful of victims, it would have had an effect on his future actions. That is the goal of restorative justice. It brings some of kind of restoration to the victims, and community, but it also seeks to change the behavior of the offender.

The serial tagger has been sentenced to almost four years in prison. What will Yazdani be like when he is released? Most would agree that he'll be more likely to re-offend. Those involved in this case (law enforcement, prosecutors, and judges) were probably very frustrated and unsure what to do with this man. But stopping crime and interrupting repeat crime requires new ways of responding. Restorative justice is that response.

To learn more about restorative justice go to the Centre for Justice and Reconciliation.

Photo by alanzoD