Howard Zehr is widely regarded as the grandfather of restorative justice. His work includes trainings and consultations on restorative justice, victim-offender conferencing, judicial reform, and other criminal justice matters, and he has had particular influence in the United States, Brazil, Japan, Jamaica, Northern Ireland, Britain, the Ukraine, and New Zealand, which has restructured its juvenile justice system into a family-focused, restorative approach. Zehr is the 2015 recipient of the Ireland Distinguished Scholar Award for his work in restorative justice.