Commentary: Restorative Justice can be powerful

I eat a steady diet of reality crime shows, cultivated by an early interest in forensics. I recently caught the episode “The Last Dance” of the show “The Perfect Murder.” In the show’s last frame, Karen Silas tells of meeting in prison her daughter’s killer where he apologized. Silas said the expression of remorse “was so freeing.” Without giving the meeting a name, Silas had engaged in restorative justice. Restorative justice is a form of punishment where an offender accepts responsibility and takes the chance to repair the hurt the offender caused.