A family violence survivor, who last year received highly-prestigious volunteer service awards from the Texas Governor’s office, Texas Dept. of Criminal Justice and the Dallas Cowboys for speaking to prison inmates and probationers about how their criminal acts have harmed family members and friends, has agreed to become one of the new board members of our Lillian Smith Family Violence Foundation.
Arlington-resident Jim Buffington, a recipient of the 2007 “Carol S. Vance” Texas Governor’s Award for Criminal Justice Volunteer Service and the $10,000 Dallas Cowboys Community Quarterback Award for volunteer service, becomes the Lillian Smith Foundation’s sixth board member.
Jim is a tireless educator and compassionate listener who volunteers regularly with Bridges to Life prison ministry, which is devoted to reducing crime by reducing the recidivism rate of released inmates.
Bridges To Life brings together victims and inmates – face to face – to help inmates understand how crime affects others and to empower crime victims by telling their “stories” of victimization – a process they call “restorative justice.”
He also speaks frequently about his childhood family violence experiences in prisons, juvenile facilities and to adult probation offenders of domestic violence offenders in Dallas County.
In 1976, when Jim was only 12 year old, his mother was murdered by two hit men whom his church-leader father hired to kill her, Jim and his two younger brothers. Fortunately they chose not to kill the children.
A year later, their father was arrested, convicted of capital murder and criminal solicitation and was sentenced to Death Row in 1979. The hit men were also arrested, convicted and sentenced to lengthy prison terms.
For several years after, Jim and his family continued to visit and minister to his father in prison – believing all that time that he was innocent – until one day after Jim had become an adult, his father finally admitted what he had done.
Quoting from the Governor’s Criminal Justice Volunteer Service Award announcement:
“Through this incredible journey, Jim has experienced both sides of the criminal justice system – as a child of a victim of crime and as a child of an offender. Jim journeyed a long road of pain and betrayal that would lead most to a life withdrawn and full of bitterness. Jim chose another path however, one of healing and forgiveness. In his volunteer work, he has helped many victims of crime, as well as offenders, down that path to healing and forgiveness. Because of his unique experiences, he has an insight into the feelings of the offenders’ families that most of us cannot relate to. Jim is able to connect with the offenders and he helps them to better understand the effects their choices have had on their families and society.”
Jim is a remarkable man, and we are thrilled that he has agreed to join us. He is married, a father and is employed as Vice President of Marketing & Business Development with the Merrill Corporation in downtown Dallas.
