My son’s killer and me: grief, pain and the power of forgiveness after a one-punch death

Jacob’s story: ‘The power shifted in our first meeting. Joan and her family were no longer victims, faceless and silent’

I was released from prison on New Year’s Eve 2012. I came out with more complex needs than I had before going in: lower self-esteem, fewer aspirations, less optimistic about the future. I was angry at myself and others. I had none of the skills required to communicate, be vulnerable or support myself. I was destined to join the 46% of people in England and Wales who reoffend within their first year post-prison. I was 20 years old with no fixed address, no qualifications or work experience and manslaughter on my criminal record.

It happened in July 2011, when I was 19. It was Saturday night and I was in Nottingham city centre after a day of drugs and drinking celebrating a friend’s birthday. I got a call around 1am from a friend – it was kicking off a few streets away. Turns out, it was my friends who were looking for trouble. I should have established the facts or tried to de-escalate. I didn’t. I arrived, without thinking, and threw a single punch. The person I hit fell to the ground as I ran away. A month later, the police turned up at my mum’s house. I was arrested on suspicion of murder: the man I’d hit had died nine days later.

After serving 14 months, I was out. Not long after, my probation officer got in touch, asking if I’d heard of restorative justice: my victim’s parents wanted to ask me questions. Questions only I had the answers to. They wanted to express the harm I had caused and to see me acknowledge the consequences of my actions.

I learned that restorative justice is a voluntary process and aims to find ways to repair the harm caused and seek a less harmful way forward. The prospect of it floored me. It’s far easier to live in ignorance than to know the damage you’ve done. I needed some time to think, before I realised it was the least I could do for them.

All contact was through a facilitator at first. I was told the questions they wanted me to answer. Mostly, they wanted to know why I’d thrown the punch. I was ashamed of the answers I had to offer. There was no reason. There’s never an excuse to punch someone, but I didn’t even have a poor one to give. I couldn’t even say I was protecting my friends, something I’d believed for a while. I had to be honest: I didn’t ask any questions about what was happening. I was just showing off, trying to impress my mates. That’s the thing about restorative justice: it’s only permitted to proceed once you’ve taken accountability for your actions.

I was surprised when they started to ask questions about me and my background. It didn’t cross my mind that they might be interested in who I was. They wanted to know about my childhood, my family and the community I grew up in. They wanted to get a sense of me: raised in Nottingham by a single mum who did her best by us. How I struggled at school, with ADHD and all sorts of labels, then started getting into trouble as a teenager: fighting first, then selling drugs. About how Mum had battled with alcoholism. She was functioning until I went into custody, then it got out of control and she lost her house and job.

Learning about Joan, her son James and their family was humanising. It cut through the labels we use to define each other. I saw them and they saw me. The ignorance had gone and so had the (relative) bliss. Telling them about myself was one thing. But then they asked me what I wanted to do with my life… I never expected it. After what I’d done, for them to show signs of care and compassion? It blew me away. I started to realise that I too had needs that I’d been neglecting. That if I was to escape the trajectory my life was taking, I needed to show an interest in myself, just like these strangers were taking an interest in me. I could tell it was important to Joan that I’d learn from what they – what we – had been through, and not make the same mistakes again.

I wrote them a letter: I’m always reluctant to say sorry to you, why would you believe me? But I’m going to show you, through my actions.

I committed there and then to changing. I didn’t know what I’d do, but I knew I’d do something. And I did. I spoke to my probation officer and came up with a plan to get back into education. I started college in September 2013, and got A*s in some of my GCSE courses. I’d never been made to believe I could amount to anything. All of a sudden there were new opportunities open to me.

Joan encouraged me to keep going. I completed a social sciences access course. Within two years, I was eligible to go to university. But systems aren’t designed for rehabilitation. The universities I applied to rejected me, deeming me a risk. I had to fight, legally, to access higher education. Lots was going on in my life then: my mum died; I became a carer for my teenage brother who moved in with me. I enrolled at university to study criminology. It was then that Joan suggested we meet face-to-face.

A neutral space was chosen in Stowmarket, Suffolk, a place neither of us had a connection to. I arrived first and was put in a holding room. I sat there waiting for them to appear. Beyond the door, I could hear the sound of their arrival; muffled speaking. A circle of chairs were laid out for us. The golden rule of restorative justice is that there will be no surprises – it’s something I had to reiterate to James Graham when his play about our story, Punch, was being developed. A piece of theatre requires drama, but in reality, every detail is planned out to ensure there isn’t a single unknown. Everyone involved knows what to expect. Each possible scenario is pre-arranged.

Still, that’s not to say as I waited to be called through, I wasn’t bricking it. I was overwhelmed by nerves and fear. Waiting to walk into a room to meet the parents of a man I killed. I was taken from my room, walked up a flight of stairs and to a door. I stood, staring at the handle. My life had changed so much in the two and a half years since my release from prison. And here I was, preparing to be confronted by my crime all over again. Stepping inside took courage. It would have been far easier to turn around and walk away. Then we started talking. What I said is a total blur – I’ve no recollection. I only remember Joan’s face as she told me how much she misses James.

The power shifted in that meeting. They were no longer victims, faceless and silent. To them, I ceased being a terrifying teenage mugshot, but a young man crying in the corner. Perpetrators of crime have the right in our justice system to remain silent, but victims of crime all too often don’t know they have a right to speak and have a voice. Instead, they’re told if the crime is solved, and punishment dished out, that justice has been delivered. It doesn’t always work that way.

At the end of the meeting we agreed a contract for the next steps. One of their requests was that something positive come from our coming together. They wanted to do some campaigning and education around one-punch deaths. I said yes. That was 2015. We’ve been working together on that and more for the past 10 years.

It gives me purpose, but it’s complicated. I’ve become defined by the worst thing I ever did, the worst choice I ever made. Now, that’s what I’m known best for – and always will be. I’ve written a book, started a podcast called Right From Wrong, and now there’s the play, alongside all my campaigning work. I have to live with that guilt every day, I cannot hide from it. The only reason I’m able to is because the people who I harmed the most judge me the least. That’s what I hold on to when hate is directed my way: “You’re a monster”; “You’re a killer”; “You don’t deserve a second chance and should be rotting in prison.”

I often think about what might have happened if I’d never met Joan. My inner optimist likes to think I might have sorted myself out: Mum had instilled in me a sense of right from wrong. But really, I don’t think I’d have ever learned to be vulnerable. I’m not sure I’d ever have become a member of society, instead remaining marginalised and angry, unable to contribute or communicate.

Life was simpler before I knew Joan and who James was. It was easier to hide behind that unknown. Now I know their pain. I’ll never be able to shy away from it. I can try to hold my head high and make the best of the circumstances, but it doesn’t make forgiving myself any easier.

Some people say it was a “tragic accident”, what happened that night. That wording was even in the script for Punch at one stage in its development. Me, Joan and James’s father David all pointed out the problem in this framing: you can’t accidentally throw a punch. It wasn’t an accident – and I have to live with that forever, even if I had no intention to cause the harm I did. We all have to live with shame and pain, that’s human. The challenge is whether we turn it into something meaningful.

Joan’s story: ‘I started to get a vague feel for this boy who’d killed my James – that there was good in him’

Jacob served just 14 months in prison for killing my son, James. He was 28 years old when he was taken from us. Jacob had been sentenced to four years for the one-punch killing. A year was taken off for his guilty plea, as was a further six months as Jacob was under 21. I felt my son’s life was worth more than a year and a bit. I was bitter and in pain; angry at the justice system.

The judge delivered that sentence around the same time as the 2011 riots that swept across the country. I watched on as people were getting longer for stealing televisions and trainers than my son’s killer got for taking a life. Someone got six months for stealing £3.50 worth of water.

Our family tried to appeal Jacob’s sentence. We lost. Jacob had pleaded guilty to manslaughter. There’d been no cross-examination, no evidence presented, no trial. David and I were left with countless questions: how had our son ended up dead that night? Was there some trivial trigger? Had he knocked someone’s pint over? I needed to know what had happened – if there was a reason he’d hit James. I could never make sense of what had happened. Nobody had ever been able to tell me why. And, I needed to know whether Jacob was going to do this again, if another family was going to be put through the devastating pain we’d suffered.

The only way I might get answers, I was told, was through restorative justice. I was put in touch with an organisation, Remedi. Initially, I think, the caseworkers were scoping us out, ascertaining intentions. They wanted to be sure we weren’t simply looking for a way to express our anger or an opportunity to take revenge on the person who’d caused us so much harm. Jacob had agreed to participate, to respond to my questions. Now, all involved wanted to ensure that if we proceeded, we’d be safe.

I had no intention of meeting him. At first, we’d communicate through a facilitator, who acted as an intermediary. If we’d asked a question, she’d deliver not just Jacob’s reply, but how he’d articulated himself. Jacob looked very sheepish, we were told, when stating there’d been no reason why that fatal punch was thrown in my son’s direction and that Jacob looked concerned, distraught and upset as he spoke. I started to get a vague feel for this boy who’d killed my James – that there was good in him. It gave me some hope that another tragedy might be avoidable.

We corresponded in this way for a couple of years, starting soon after his release. I asked Jacob to look at his life, what he had planned for his future. We were told he was surprised – shocked, even – that we were interested in the direction his path took next. I firmly felt he had to do something, to make something of himself. He’d dropped out of school at 14. His life was spiralling.

It was at that time I realised that fighting to see Jacob locked up for longer would have served nobody. Him sitting in prison wouldn’t bring my James back and prison had done no good to support or rehabilitate Jacob. I had to consider my own health and future, too. There was no purpose, I kept thinking, in spending the rest of my life consumed by misery and bitterness.

Three years after we were first in touch, in 2015 we arranged to meet in person. It had been a tough time for Jacob. Soon after he’d done his GCSEs, his mum died. Other relatives, too. It gave him, I think, a greater understanding of loss. He persevered with a university-access course. I made sure to keep on checking his progress. I wanted to offer him some guardianship, for him to know there was someone invested in him, someone who cared.

It’s fair to say that the first face-to-face meeting was harder for Jacob than for me and David. We were sitting in a room waiting. The facilitators were there. Victim support, too. Then he walked in. It must have felt like walking into the lion’s den. Before I would hear from him, however, I needed Jacob to listen. I needed him to learn about James: the boy he was; the boy we lost.

James was an adventurous boy, on the cusp of qualifying as a paramedic. We raised him in Suffolk and he’d recently moved to London for his career. He helped mentor children who didn’t have families, and volunteered at Childline. He also drove me crazy with his adrenaline-hunting: skiing, jumping out of helicopters, bungee jumping in a sleeping bag. Often for charity.

Whenever he’d go on one of these trips, I’d hug him tightly, say a big goodbye, then endlessly worry. Then this one Saturday in July 2011, James told me he was off to see the cricket in Nottingham with his dad and brother. I thought nothing of it. They went to their match on the Saturday. Before I retired I was a nurse and I worked a shift that Saturday night.

Sunday morning, I was at home when I got the call: James had been attacked hours earlier and hadn’t regained consciousness. My other son had gone to ask for James’s sunglasses back after one of Jacob’s friends had taken them. Those lads were angling for a fight. After James was punched, his father chased after Jacob, but he got away. James was put into an ambulance, vomiting. By morning, he was being taken for scans, with a suspected brain injury.

My whole world was upside down. I packed a bag and my sister picked me up – I was in no fit state to drive. James was in surgery by the time I arrived at the hospital. Immediately afterwards, he was put into critical care. For nine days I sat with him. At first, it looked hopeful. The doctors started to bring James round, but something was wrong. His brain was swelling.

More emergency surgery. Afterwards, the medics said the signs were positive. Within a few days, though, he was failing. In the last 24 hours, he started deteriorating quickly. In the end I asked for the life support machine to be switched off.

It was that, or watch him deteriorate entirely over another 24 or 48 hours. The choice was impossibly hard. But it was for James – he wasn’t going to get any better. We were watching him fade. Why put him through more pain? On 9 August, James died.

I have to live with all these memories. This, and so much more, we told Jacob in that room in Stowmarket. I needed him to know.

There were strict parameters to our relationship for a while, out of necessity. These mediated meetings, then some direct emails. I knew I wanted the best for Jacob, but it was hard to see him, honestly. It stirred up so many emotions. I was still grieving – it would open up new wounds.

Over time, though, we both realised we wanted to keep in touch in a way that felt more natural. More human. At first, he’d just send life updates and ask how we were doing, but then we started doing work together – speaking at events. We both do talks in prison and in schools, and lots with the Forgiveness Project. My message is this: if you’ve done something wrong, there’s always a way to change course.

We go out for meals and coffees now. We talk about what we can do next to spread the word about restorative justice. That message is stronger when we’re together. We also have a relationship – a friendship, I suppose. I often meet people now in similar situations to mine and my family’s all those years ago, victims and their families who feel our criminal justice system has been too soft on their perpetrator. I never blame them, tell them they’re wrong or pass judgment. I’ve been there myself – restorative justice isn’t for everybody. And, had Jacob been a different person, I may well have stayed feeling that way for the rest of my life. But my advice is always the same: do what feels right, yes, but if you can, give the process a try.

It’s strange. Often I find I get more trolls, more abuse, from people on the internet than Jacob. People post, “Why didn’t I meet him and punch his lights out?” Or, “This is sick; she’s trying to replace her son?” They just don’t understand.

I’d have remained very bitter if we’d never started this process. I’d have spent the rest of my life feeling a failure – like I’d never got justice for James. But I don’t feel that way now. My son had a strong sense of right and wrong. He was empathetic and generous. He’d have wanted us to make something good from the tragedy – which we’ve done.

Jacob has written his book. Now there’s the play. Each time, it brings things back. When the play was on in Nottingham, I went four times, for different reasons. I feel the daggers through my heart each time. But I need to be there through it all to make sure James is portrayed correctly. He’s not here to speak for himself.

I’m in no doubt that restorative justice did more good than prison did for Jacob. Everything that he’s done since is of far more value – to himself, to us and society – than him being locked up in a cell. Still, I see the pain he’s in. Jacob has to learn to let go of what he’s done. Especially now that he’s a father: you can’t begin to understand what it might be like to lose a child until you’ve got one of your own. Seeing his own son grow, Jacob sees what he took from me.

I’ve said this to Jacob: I can never forgive him for killing my son. He did and he can’t change that, and I can’t either, no matter what. He’ll always be the boy who did that to us. But I forgive him for throwing the punch; for what he intended to do. I know now, in my heart, he didn’t mean for what happened to happen. He didn’t want to kill James. And knowing that helps. It offers both of us a way forward.

James Graham’s Punch runs at the Young Vic from 1 March to 26 April (youngvic.org)