From Harm to Healing
Through our Direct Services Programs, Healing Justice offers a variety of transformative programs that provide individualized and group healing opportunities and enable recovery for individuals, families, and communities harmed by wrongful convictions. Specific direct service programs include individual and group peer-to-peer support, restorative justice opportunities, in-person healing retreats, and specialized online support resources.
Through our Technical Assistance Programs, Healing Justice provides transformative technical assistance programs, in partnership with local organizations, government agencies, and others, to help agencies and professionals expand post-conviction victim services and protect victims’ rights. These programs include specialized training, the development of customized tools and resources, recommendations on individual cases, assistance with supporting victims/survivors, and more.
Through this unique combination of program services, we transform the lives and communities of those harmed and leverage their experiences to transform the legal system. Our model of transformative justice can be applied to all contexts and cases of injustice where healing is needed in order for justice to be achieved.
“Never have I been able to share my story and thoughts in such a safe and caring space. To be able to sit with others and share my experiences was just incredible. The support allowed me to move forward in my healing process.”
- Crime Survivor
“Your panel had a profound impact on our approach to post-conviction victim contact. We had a system in place before, but I walked away thinking that we could be doing so much more."
- Prosecutor
"Share, cry, release, laugh, heal. That's what Healing Justice is to me. Thank you for helping put me back together again."
- Family Member
Question: As a result of Healing Justice’s presentation, please share action you will take to change your professional practice/performance.
Answer: “Provide victims and families with advocacy from start to finish. Keep them informed of all steps!”
- Victim Advocate
"So healing and therapeutic. I learned so much and can use these tools in life."
- Exoneree
“My support family just grew by 25 people! [Healing Justice] has given me support beyond my imagination. Thank you.”
- Family Member
"I was able to reconnect to the person I left behind when I was sent to prison."
- Exoneree
“I Have not felt so safe since I was a child.”
- Crime Survivor
Lives and families are forever devastated by violent crime, and people and communities rightly count on police, prosecutors, and our criminal legal system to ensure public safety and justice. However, the grief, loss, and trauma of violent crime are compounded when mistakes are made that cause the wrong person to be arrested and convicted. In these cases, the harm extends from victims and survivors of violent crime to the wrongly convicted, and to witnesses, police, prosecutors, jurors, judges, and all others who are involved. The harm is complex, long-lasting, multi-generational, and infects all aspects of individuals' and families' lives, from emotional and physical health to economic and social stability.
Healing Justice seeks to address this widespread harm through (1) providing direct support to victims and survivors of violent crime, individuals who have been exonerated, and both of their families, and (2) expanding and improving the information and services offered by the criminal legal system to victims and survivors of violent crime (crime victims/survivors) in these cases.
Specifically, during post-conviction case activity, Healing Justice offers interventions for victims and survivors of violent crime, professionals, and providers. These interventions include improved information, support, and services for victims and survivors of violent crime, as well as training and resource development for professionals and providers. After a wrongful conviction case has been resolved, Healing Justice offers interventions that allow all impacted parties to engage in individualized and case- or community-specific recovery. These interventions include individual or group peer support, specialized online resources, and opportunities for restorative justice.
Healing Justice’s work is led by real people with lived experiences, all of whom contribute their own unique perspectives to our goals and programs. Through all of our work we strive to restore the voices of those harmed, create collective healing and prevent future harm.
Healing Justice is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization (ID number 47-3424404). Our mailing address is: 11312 US 15-501 N, Suite 107 - #181, Chapel Hill, NC 27517. You can also reach us at: info@healingjusticeproject.org.