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The Community Justice Panel launch

A SCHEME in which victims and offenders come face-to-face has been officially launched in Wellington.

The Wellington Community Justice Panel is designed to bring victims, offenders and communities together to decide on a response to low-level crime.

The Wellington town, district and county councillor Andrew Govier has been campaigning for the scheme to start in the town after seeing the success of the Chard and Ilminster Community Justice project, which is backed by the our sister paper, the Chard and Ilminster News.

He said: "I've been concerned for a number of years about anti-social behaviour and the way some people ruin the town for other people.

"I thought it was a very good way of allowing people to see the impact of their crimes on the victim and I thought it also gave the victim the chance to have their say on what would put the problem right."

Minor criminal damage such as graffiti or anti-social behaviour is among the crimes that would be dealt with by the new restorative justice panel.

Offenders who admit their crimes are giv-en the choice of going before a panel of local people, which may include the victim.

The panel may ask for an apology and will decide upon a restorative' punishment, which might include being told to clean up the graffiti they have caused or repairing criminal damage.

They will usually also sign an acceptable behaviour contract - a declaration of an in-tent to stay out of trouble.

Somerset West District's commander Ch Supt Sandy Padgett said: "I think it's a really good opportunity to bring justice back into the community.

"It's about pulling people together from the community and other agencies, looking at the issues that affect those individuals and putting them towards a panel and for the panel to decide what should actually happen."

2:06pm Thursday 24th April 2008

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