The National Center on Restorative Justice’s Restorative Justice Laws Database was created as a resource for restorative justice advocates, practitioners, and researchers as well as policy-makers across the United States. Our aim is to organize and display in an easily navigated format the ways in which states have codified the use of restorative justice approaches.
Thank you to Shannon Sliva (University of Denver) and Thalia González (UC Law San Francisco) for their advisement and expertise throughout the process of creating this database. Thank you to Karen Sheu and Anna VanRoy for their data collection work.
This Restorative Justice Laws Database builds on an earlier legislative directory created in 2014 by Shannon Sliva in partnership with Carolyn Lambert (Georgia State University College of Law) and hosted by the University of Denver Graduate School of Social Work from 2019 to 2024.
The laws included in this database were identified by conducting a search in Westlaw and LexisNexis using the terms visible under “Form of Practice” in the database search options below. Only laws that feature one or more of these terms are included in the database. Use of the terms in the text of the law does not necessarily mean that restorative justice practice is occurring in the given jurisdiction.
The NCORJ is committed to continuing to update this database. If you see something that is missing or a correction is required, please be in touch. For more information about the development of the database, to get assistance navigating it, or to request a copy of the raw data for research purposes, please contact Lindsey Pointer (lpointer@vermontlaw.edu).
the department shall utilize programming that addresses the unique needs of those in restrictive housing. The department shall provide persons in restrictive housing with access to core educational and other programming comparable to core programs in the general population. The…
twenty-five thousand dollars ($ 25,000) to develop and implement a restorative justice program as an alternative method to deal with school-based offenses in the Santa Fe public school district;
take appropriate measures to discipline a law enforcement officer, including facilitating mediation or other restorative justice measures, when it is determined that the law enforcement officer violated the provisions of Section 2 [29-21-2 NMSA 1978] of the Prohibition of Profiling…
An Act concerning restorative justice in the public schools and supplementing chapter 37 of Title 18A of the New Jersey Statutes.
There is established within the Department of Education a fund to be known as the “Restorative Justice Education Fund.” The fund shall be used to provide grants to participating schools pursuant to subsection c. of section 4 [C.18A:37-41] of this…
Within six months of the effective date of this act, the Commissioner of Education shall establish a three-year “Restorative Justice in Education Pilot Program” to implement restorative justice practices in the public schools. The program shall address school discipline issues…
An Act establishing a “Sexual Violence Restorative Justice Pilot Program.”
“Restorative justice” means a system of dispute resolution tools that allow all parties of a dispute to be involved in defining the harm and devising remedies while giving the necessary attention to community safety, victims’ needs, and the need for…
identifying, developing recommendations on, and setting crime response policies that may impact the range of victim populations, including restorative justice approaches and other solutions; and
The training course and curriculum shall include a component emphasizing the value of restorative justice in sexual assault cases.