BEFORE THE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE

OF THE

PENNSYLVANIA HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

March 30, 2007

TESTIMONY

OF

JAMES P. KIMMEL, JR., J.D., ESQ.

Founder

Nonjustice Foundation

P.O. Box 1139

Kennett Square, PA 19348

610.347.0780

www.nonjustice.org

I would like to thank the Members of the House Judiciary Committee and Rep. Dwight Evans for inviting me to testify this morning about justice addiction as the root cause of the growing level of violence in Philadelphia and across the Commonwealth and what the Pennsylvania legislature can do to help.

Before I begin, I ask that, for a brief moment, you forget everything you have been told so far about the causes of violence and the solutions. I do this because recent discoveries in neuroscience have shed new light on the subject and require that we radically alter our thinking and our response.

When you walk through a neighborhood and you see people carrying packages out of liquor stores and you see people passed out in the gutters and you find empty bottles of whiskey on the ground, you know there’s an alcohol addiction problem in that community. When you walk through a neighborhood and you see people buying small packets on the street corners and you see people walking around in a daze and you find used syringes on the ground, you know there’s a drug addiction problem in that community. Now, when you walk through a neighborhood and you see people carrying handguns and you see dead bodies with bullet holes in them on the sidewalks, and you see empty shell casings on the ground, what do we know about that community?

Recent advances in science and medicine now tells us that there’s a justice addiction problem in that community.

You have probably never heard it put this way before, but justice addiction is the oldest and most deadly addiction in the world. Cain killed Abel to get justice and since then the justice addiction has caused more suffering, death, and destruction than all other addictions combined. What is justice addiction? In Philadelphia, it’s the addiction to street justice—justice in the form of revenge. It means being addicted to inflicting harm on others when you’ve been harmed in the hope and belief that it will make you feel better.

As a lawyer who holds a doctorate in jurisprudence from the University of Pennsylvania, who interned with the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, clerked for a federal trial court judge, and practiced as a civil litigator with one of the largest law firms in the state, I have a particular interest in the reasons why people seek justice and what they are willing to do to get it. Although the craving for justice in the form of revenge has plagued humanity since Biblical times, it was first identified as a scientifically diagnosable addiction in my 2005 book entitled Suing for Peace (Hampton Roads, 2005). In that book, I discuss a landmark study published in the Journal Science in 2004 by a team of Swiss researchers who demonstrated that getting justice against others by inflicting punishment upon them stimulates the same pleasure centers in the brain that are activated by eating chocolate, having sex, and taking drugs. (The Neural Basis of Altruistic Punishment, Dominique J.-F.de Quervain et al, Science 27 August 2004, 305; 1254-58). Just last year, a group of British researchers published a study in the journal Nature confirming these results and finding that the powerful sensations of pleasure we derive from getting justice against our enemies are much stronger in the brains of men than in women. (Empathic Neural Responses Are Modulated By The Perceived Fairness Of Others, Tania Singer, et al., Nature 2006 January 26; 439, 466-69). In other words, scientists have now discovered that getting justice in the form of revenge gives all people, but especially men, a high not unlike the high of heroin and can become a biologically compulsive addiction.

These recent scientific studies add strong empirical support to my own research and experiences as a lawyer that seeking justice in the form of revenge is the underlying cause of human violence and a biological, psychological, and sociological addiction. These studies also support recent findings by Philadelphia Police Commissioner Sylvester M. Johnson that the vast majority of murders in Philadelphia in 2005 were the result not of drug violence but of people seeking justice during simple disputes. (Violent Crime Rising Sharply in some Cities, New York Times Feb. 12, 2006).

Like drug addicts and alcoholics, justice addicts become desensitized to inflicting punishment and crave it more and more, in greater and greater quantities. Like drug addicts and alcoholics, justice addicts become obsessed with getting justice in the form of revenge and give up other gainful activities to get it. Like drug addicts and alcoholics, justice addicts keep indulging their cravings for revenge even while knowing that their behavior harms themselves and others. In fact, all of the symptoms of addiction and dependence identified by the American Psychological Association and the World Health Organization are present with justice-seeking behavior. (APA, DSM-IV-TR; WHO, ICD-10) Unfortunately, unlike drug addicts or alcoholics justice addicts must inflict harm upon others to gratify their addiction. Murder, torture, rape, assault—all these are the narcotics of the justice addict. Guns, knives, and fists—these are their drug paraphernalia. Justice addicts start on their road to addiction by returning insults for insults, punches for punches, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. As their tolerance level increases and their cravings grow, they need more and more of it until returning insults with bullets is the only way to satisfy their addiction.

When large numbers of people in a community become addicted to getting justice, we see murder rates rise. When large numbers of religious and political extremists become addicted to getting justice—as we have seen in the Middle East and here in this country on September 11, 2001—we have terrorism. When entire ethnic groups become addicted to getting justice—as in Rwanda and, more recently, the Sudan—we witness genocide. When entire nations become addicted to getting justice, we experience world war. The justice addiction is truly the most dangerous and the most cruel of all addictive behaviors. But ask yourselves this: Why are there are no treatment centers or 12-step programs for justice addicts?

The justice addiction is what is ravaging the streets of Philadelphia. The Police Commissioner has acknowledged as much himself. The men in many of our neighborhoods are killing each other because they are addicted to getting justice and they can’t stop. I know that what I am about to say is difficult to hear, but we must be honest with ourselves if we truly want to end the violence. The indisputable scientific facts are these: It feels good, at least for a moment, to put a bullet in the head of somebody who threatened you. It feels intensely pleasurable, at least for a moment, to put a bullet in the chest of somebody who stole from you. It feels intensely gratifying, at least for a moment, to put a bullet in the buttocks or stomach of somebody who disrespected you. If it didn’t feel so good, these men wouldn’t be doing it, because it’s entirely against their self interest—they risk injury and death by engaging in this behavior and yet they do it anyway, despite the efforts of the police and the District Attorney. The bottom line is that we have a situation here in Philadelphia where a large number of people in our community are addicted to getting justice in the form of murder. The threat of punishment does not deter them. They are addicts; their behavior is beyond their control. They need help, and we who will become their victims need help. But the Commonwealth and the City of Philadelphia, either unaware of or unwilling to acknowledge this addiction, have been doing just the opposite of helping. It is time for fresh thinking and a new approach. The old ways are not working.

When somebody is addicted to alcohol, do you take them to a liquor store and give them more whisky? No, you keep them away from liquor stores, you throw away their whisky, and you help them overcome their craving. When somebody is addicted to drugs, do you take them to a drug dealer and give them more drugs? No, you keep them away from drug dealers, you throw away their drugs, and you help them overcome their craving. So why, then, when somebody is addicted to justice, do we take them to the courts, throw them in the prisons, and give them more justice? We’re only fueling their rage and making them crave justice even more. The reason recidivism rates are so high is because our criminal justice system is making people more hopelessly addicted—feeding them revenge 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and teaching them that the proper way to respond to a wrong is to inflict greater and greater levels of punishment and suffering upon others.

And now we arrive at the most important question. How do we begin to conquer the justice addiction? Well, like other addictions, the first step is to admit publicly that we have a problem. This is something that the legislature is uniquely suited to do. The next step is to provide an alternative for people to manage their justice cravings and to respond when they are wronged. In my book Suing for Peace, I call this alternative the practice of “nonjustice,” and I call the method of practicing nonjustice the “Nonjustice System,” which is the missing 9-step program for justice addicts. Nonjustice means, simply and powerfully, to abstain from seeking justice when we are wronged and in the process to stop hurting ourselves further. It is based upon my research of the ancient justice teachings of the world’s religions which grapple with these very issues. One of the interesting aspects of the justice addiction is that it is closely bound up with religious beliefs, just as our criminal justice system itself is bound up with religious beliefs. This means that in addition to science, medicine, psychology, sociology, and the law, there is an important role for spiritual leaders in helping people overcome the justice addiction.

There is much more I could say, but I see that I am running out of time. I would like to conclude my testimony by identifying four concrete steps the Pennsylvania legislature can take in the coming weeks to help the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania conquer the justice addiction and reduce the level of violence in our communities.

1. Acknowledge and declare that justice addiction is a major public health problem that is taking thousands of lives in Pennsylvania. Legislative acknowledgment of the problem will launch into action the medical, scientific, psychological, sociological, legal, and spiritual sectors and is the single most important (and least expensive) thing the legislature can and should do in the coming weeks. Bringing the problem to light will begin to change thinking and, ultimately, change behavior.

2. The House Judiciary Committee should hold hearings inside prisons around the state and take the testimony of the inmates there whose lives have been ruined because of this deadly addiction. If you want to diagnose and treat a disease, you must examine the people who are sick. Holding hearings in neighborhoods is a good start but it gives you only half the picture. Ask the men who commit murder to explain why they do it. You will find that although their circumstances are different, they all shared one thing in common before they killed—an intense, uncontrollable craving for justice.

3. Provide funding and direct the Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Health to conduct research into the justice addiction, its causes, and its potential cures from a public health perspective. [In addition to the two recent studies I mentioned earlier, Professors Owen Jones and Rene Marois at Vanderbilt University are leading the nation in applying neurological research to legal questions, justice seeking behavior and punishment. (The Brain on the Stand, Jeffery Rosen, New York Times, March 11, 2007)]

4. Finally, provide funding and direct the Pennsylvania Attorney General to research the justice addiction, its causes, and potential responses from a criminal justice perspective. In addition to my own legal research on the justice addiction in my book Suing for Peace, Professor of Sociology Leroy H. Pelton of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas recently published a book entitled Frames of Justice (Transaction, 2005) arguing that our retribution-based criminal justice systems are destructive from a social policy perspective. In addition, Assistant Professor of Psychology Joshua D. Greene at Harvard University and Professor of Psychology Jonathan D. Cohen at Princeton University have argued that because the motivation to seek justice appears to be beyond the control of most people, the criminal justice system should abandon the idea of retribution and focus more on deterring future harms. (The Brain on the Stand, Jeffery Rosen, New York Times, March 11, 2007)

This concludes my prepared remarks. Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. I hope I have shed some new light on the subject and I would be happy to answer any questions you might have.