After the Accident

Winner of Amnesty International's Protect the Human award, this play looks at restorative justice in the face of unimaginable tragedy: the death of a child.

Winner of Amnesty International's Protect the Human award, this play looks at restorative justice in the face of unimaginable tragedy: a child's death after a joy-riding accident. Combining powerful naturalism with a strongly expressive thread, the drama unpicks the web of shared emotional devastation wrought on parents and killer alike.

A child's life is snuffed out by a joy-rider. Four years on, the parents and the young lad meet.

In this award-winning drama, writer Julian Armitstead explores the process of restorative or reparative justice, by which victim and offender are brought face to face, in a common endeavour to repair the harm caused by crime. Combining powerful naturalism with a strongly expressive thread, the drama unpicks the web of shared emotional devastation wrought on parents and killer alike.

The strength of Armitstead's writing lies in his compassionate objectivity: he draws his characters and the dilemmas they face with real clarity, showing their all too human weaknesses, but also the strength of their desire to find a way forward with their lives.