A link in the chain.

Something remarkable happened at New Zealand Police's Christchurch headquarters recently. In a conference room that would normally host strategy meetings, police officers sat listening intently to Pathway Reintegration Navigator Matiu Brokenshire sharing his life story.

The invitation for this came from an officer who knows Matiu from before his life transformation, having arrested him on multiple occasions. Rather than letting this remain a barrier, this officer recognised an opportunity for learning and asked Matiu to speak about his journey.

Matiu's message centred on a powerful truth about reintegration: it's built on countless small moments of human connection. He shared how police officers played crucial roles in his transformation, often without realising it.

"There was a time when someone stopped and saw me at the right time, and they were a link in the chain of many people that made a difference in my life," Matiu told them. He recounted a moment when, sitting in a police cell after reacting violently to a personal loss, an officer approached him with unexpected compassion.

"This cop goes, 'Matiu, you must be hurting right now... what happened?' And so he saw the bigger picture and I went, wow, someone's seen me."

This moment of being truly seen, recognised as a person in pain rather than simply a problem to be processed, was one of many building blocks in Matiu's transformation.

Another point Matiu discussed was that police officers are often present at the very beginning of someone's journey. As Matiu explained, they have unique opportunities to plant seeds that might flourish into positive change.

"If you've been seen by four people before you did the crime, and then seen by a cop on the day you got arrested, and then you end up with Pathway and they see you... Each of those is a small difference in someone's journey. And that's what the cop can be, another link in the chain of transformation."

The officers described feeling both challenged and privileged to hear his perspective. For many, it was the first time they'd heard ‘the other side of the story’, understanding how their interactions are experienced and the lasting impact those moments can have.

The willingness of Christchurch Police to seek out Matiu's perspective represents exactly the kind of innovative thinking we champion at Pathway. By creating space for dialogue between those who enforce the law and those who have experienced it from the other side, we build our understanding of the cycle of poverty, violence and crime in New Zealand.

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