This is the last of four columns in a series about the nation’s oldest and most mature restorative juvenile justice system.

Late one night, a bunch of punks armed with a car, a baseball bat and poop for brains decided to go mailbox smashing. They drove down a street in one of Vermont’s lovely neighborhoods and took out all the mailboxes as they cruised. Such a blast.

According to David Karp, a sociology professor at Skidmore College who was an evaluator of Vermont’s juvenile justice program, this midnight wilding “was the sort of thing that might be thought of as a bad juvenile prank. But for one old woman who came out and found her mailbox smashed, it was a lot more. That particular day was the first anniversary of her husband’s passing. He had a workshop and was a craftsman, and this hand-made mailbox was the last thing he’d made for her. So she was quite upset.”

The kids were caught and sent as a group to their community restorative panel. Trained community volunteers listened to each of them tell their version of the story, admitting to what they’d done. But the justice system in Vermont strongly urges crime victims to come to the panel meeting to describe their experience. The old lady came and gave rich, personal meaning to a mailbox that had just been a plaything to the boys who’d wrecked it.

Karp said, “The panel meeting between the offenders and victim was very tearful. The primary impact was the boys’ understanding of what they’d done to the victims.”

When the offender and the victim get together in a structured meeting, the crime ceases to be an abstraction to both sides. The old lady heard about whatever silliness the boys were thinking at the time, and no longer has to wonder if she’ll be targeted again, or if the vandalism was personal to her. The victim also gets to describe her experience, which usually sparks empathy and remorse from kids who are only barely mature enough to think beyond their narcissistic selves.

Justice is about relationships. People harm each other. That harm occurs within a community whose rules and sense of order has been breached.

Well, more accurately, restorative justice is about relationships. Retributive justice is about revenge, which too often merely continues a cycle of harm. Punishment often leads to more acting out, then more punishment, more retribution.

Vermont’s system works to repair relationships. So in the course of evaluating Vermont’s system, Karp became particularly interested in the challenges of drawing all the parties — offenders, victims and the offenders’ parents — into the process of relationship repair. This requires everyone fully participating in the panels.

So for example, Karp muses, “How do you draw into conversation a young male who’s not very articulate? The panels are embarrassing for them. Some cross their arms and pull the bill of their baseball cap down over their eyes. But it’s possible — and important — to teach guys how to engage around difficult issues without withdrawing.” Over the years, those working to perfect the panels have gotten increasingly adept at keeping the kids engaged and not shut down.

After all, most offenders are being held accountable for something that was really stupid. Karp’s 2004 article, called “Reluctant Participants in Restorative Justice? Youthful Offenders and their Parents,” written with three other authors, includes bits of transcripts from various panel meetings. The repeated refrain from the kids was variations on “I just wasn’t thinking at the time.” The point of the panel meetings, and of the reparations the offenders must perform, is to teach kids to think before they act, next time. All kids must learn to control their impulsiveness. Some need to sweat through Vermont’s accountability system to drive home the lesson that other people can be seriously harmed by their thoughtlessness.

Consider this errant stupidity, related in Karp’s article. “Lester played a practical joke on another student by pouring a laxative into his drink. The student contracted diarrhea and vomited for many hours. ... Lester was deeply remorseful. He understood the pain that the boy had gone through. (Lester said,) ‘He was pale; he had the chills, sweating and dry heaving. That’s got to hurt. When I found out he got sick, I felt so sorry for him.’ ” It was a nasty road for everyone, but Lester learned empathy. Mere punishment never teaches that.

Parents often feel isolated with their rebellious or heedless kid, so most are grateful for the panel’s attentions. As one parent said, “These people seem to want to help my son get on the right track. Just the way they were talking to him made me feel comfortable to have him talk to them.” Parents appreciate being included in the discussion about reparations. In conventional courts, parents resent being ordered about by judges and become defensive and uncooperative when they feel their child is under attack. Most of the parents Karp studied felt that the restoration process helped their child mature.

Karp said of his study, “In Vermont there was very high victim satisfaction. The community felt the restorative panels got the kid back on track. Other studies, in Indiana and elsewhere in the Midwest, clearly show that restorative justice results in lower recidivism rates over many years. Not only are the kids less likely to get into trouble again, but if they do, it’s for lesser crimes.”

The Vermont system helps once-troubled kids to grow up and stay out of trouble. Instead of being beaten into submission and often provoked into acting out later on, restorative justice teaches offenders real lessons that will serve them well.

In short, Vermont’s juvenile justice system is civilized. America’s kids badly need other states to take similarly civilized attitudes.

Because retributive punishment just doesn’t work.

Julia Steiny, a former member of the Providence School Board, consults for government agencies and schools; she is co-director of Information Works!, Rhode Island’s school-accountability project. She can be reached at juliasteiny@gmail.com, or c/o EdWatch, The Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902.