Bringing hope & healing through awareness, support, advocacy & community enhancement.
Bringing hope & healing through awareness, support, advocacy & community enhancement.
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"This project is supported by a National Crime Victims' Rights Week Community Awareness Project subgrant awarded by the National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators under a Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) grant from the Office for Victims of Crime, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice."
National Crime Victims' Rights Week, which is being observed nationwide during the week of April 24-30, 2022. Since 1981, National Crime Victims’ Rights Week (NCVRW) has challenged the Nation to confront and remove barriers to achieving justice for all victims of crime.
Each year, communities across the country revisit the history of the victims’ rights movement, celebrate the progress made, and recommit to further advancements in the field. The 2022 NCVRW theme is Rights, access, equity, for all victims. The theme underscores the importance of helping crime survivors find their justice by—
• enforcing victims’ rights,
• expanding access to services, and
• ensuring equity and inclusion for all.
Victims’ Rights
By enforcing victims’ rights, victim service providers and other allied professionals promote a fair and balanced justice system that encourages respect, dignity, and meaningful participation among those most directly impacted by crime. By ensuring that equitable, inclusive and meaningful compensation are available to survivors, we can help all victims find the justice and healing they seek.
True freedom requires the rule of law and justice, and a judicial system in which the rights of some are not secured by the denial of rights to others.
– Jonathan Sacks (1948–2020)
Access to Services
Making real the promise of equal justice under law was the founding principle of the Department of Justice and is the mission for which it must always stand. There can be no equal justice without equal access to justice. And because we do not yet have equal access to justice in America, the task before us is urgent.
– Merrick B. Garland (1952– )
Justice exists only if it is accessible to all.
– Vanita Gupta (1974– )
Equity and Inclusion for All
It is not possible to be in favor of justice for some people and not be in favor of justice for all people.
–Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968)
National Crime Victims’ Rights Week affords us the opportunity to honor the perseverance, innovation, and unyielding commitment of our victim service providers and the strength and resilience of crime victims across the country.
Since 2010 the Issachar K. Tigre Chinnery Foundation-Victims United, Inc. has been engaged the commemoration of National Crime Victims Rights Week in the Territory, and is spearheading this year’s activities which will include the following:
• Saturday, April 23, 2022 —Community Awareness Outreach/Bucket Drop Brigade at various locations throughout the Territory;
• Monday April, 25, 2022—Community Awareness Outreach/Bucket Drop Brigade on St. John;
• Saturday, April 30, 2022 —Awareness Walk—Roosevelt Park to Mandela Circle and back starting at 7 a.m. then to exhibits and fun-filled interaction with Service and Care and Providers at Roosevelt Park—Activity Filled Family Fun-day /Community Awareness Fair
“The National Crime Victims’ Rights Week Community Awareness Projects are supported under cooperative agreement number 15POVC-21-GK-00412-NONF awarded by the Office for Victims of Crime, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice to the National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators.”
Every year, millions of Americans are affected by crime. Many will need ongoing care and resources. April 24–30 is National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, a time to celebrate the progress achieved, raise awareness of victims’ rights and services, and stand with our families, neighbors, friends, and colleagues whose lives have been forever altered by crime. We resolve to help them find their justice and forge new healing pathways. We commit to enforcing victims’ rights, expanding access to victim services, and providing equity and inclusion for all. This National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, show victims they are not alone.* Call Victims United Inc at (340) 642-5204 to learn how you or someone you know can get the help they need.
Derechos de las víctimas
Debemos recordar que cuando alguien pierde un derecho todos lo perdemos. – William Reece Smith, Jr. (1925–2013) Al dar derechos a otros directamente afectados, nos otorgamos derechos a nosotros mismos y a nuestro país.
– John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917–1963)
La verdadera libertad requiere el estado de derecho y la justicia, y un sistema judicial en el cual los derechos de algunos no estén asegurados mediante la denegación de los derechos de otros.
– Jonathan Sacks (1948–2020)
No debemos solo poner vendas en las llagas de las víctimas heridas bajo las ruedas de la injusticia, debemos poner freno a las ruedas mismas.
– Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945)
Acceso a servicios
Concretar la promesa de igualdad ante la justicia conforme a la ley fue el principio fundador del Departamento de Justicia y es la misión que debemos representar siempre. No puede haber igualdad ante la justicia sin igualdad de acceso a la justicia. Y dado que todavía no tenemos igualdad de acceso a la justicia en los Estados Unidos, la tarea que tenemos por delante es urgente.
– Merrick B. Garland (1952– )
Igualdad e inclusión para todos
La justicia que no se basa en la igualdad, en el bienestar social y en la comunidad no es justicia en absoluto.
– DeRay Mckesson (1985– )
No es posible estar a favor de la justicia para algunos y no estar a favor de la justicia para todas las personas.
– Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968)
Si uno es neutral en situaciones de injusticia, ha elegido estar del lado del opresor.
– Desmond Tutu
Improving Language Access for Immigrant and Refugee Crime Victims
1 The United States is remarkably diverse. According to American Community Survey data collected from 2009 to 2013, American households speak more than 350 languages.1 Diversity, in all of its forms, is the bedrock of American democracy. However, for the roughly 25.1 million individuals over the age of 5 who do not speak English as their primary language— who are categorized as Limited English Proficient (LEP)—their linguistic diversity is too often a barrier to accessing critical public services. Systemic inequalities in language access are particularly harmful to immigrant and refugee victims of crime, who are more at risk of robbery, assault, theft, human trafficking, and intimate partner violence than the general population. A selfreported survey of 90 undocumented Latinos living in Memphis, Tennessee, found that 63 percent of respondents had been a victim of one or more crimes.
2 Immigrants and refugees are also less likely to report the crimes they experience.
3 Many immigrant and refugee crime victims experience added layers of stress, isolation, and depression when they are not able to access services due to language barriers. Nearly one in three Spanish-speaking Latinas surveyed by the National Latina Network at Casa de Esperanza reported that they had encountered challenges accessing domestic violence-related services because of language barriers.4 Addressing language access barriers for immigrant and refugee populations is rarely as simple as translating forms or brochures into non-English languages. While translation is part of the solution, victim service providers must go further. Under federal law and executive orders, all agencies that receive federal funds must make a reasonable effort to provide meaningful language access for LEP individuals. In practice, though, victim service providers are often unaware of this requirement or do not understand how to provide meaningful language access. Ultimately, access is about choice and knowledge. LEP crime victims need to be informed of their rights in a language they can understand. They need to be made aware of the availability of culturally competent services to help them. Organizations must respect cultural differences. They should have formal language access policies and qualified interpreters and translators available, when needed. We, in the victim services field, must make a conscious decision to build organizations that reflect our multicultural and multilingual nation, from the inside out.
1 U.S. Census Bureau (2015). “2013 American Community Survey.” Retrieved from https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/USCENSUS/ bulletins/122dd88.
2 Bucher, Jacob; Manasse, Michelle; and Tarasawa, Beth. (2010). “Undocumented Victims: An Examination of Crimes Against Undocumented Male Migrant Workers.” Southwest Journal of Criminal Justice. 7. Retrieved from www.researchgate.net/publication/267378044_Undocumented_ Victims_An_Examination_of_Crimes_Against_Undocumented_Male_Migrant_Workers. 3 Davis, R.C., and E. Erez. Immigrant Populations as Victims: Toward a Multicultural Criminal Justice System. Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, May 1998, NCJ 167571. 4 National Latin@ Network for Healthy Families and Communities and National Domestic Violence Hotline (2013). Realidades Latinas. A National Survey on the Impact of Immigration and Language Access on Latina Survivors, (Research Report No. 2013.4). Retrieved from www. nationallatinonetwork.org/research/nln-research
During National Crime Victims' Rights Week and throughout the year, we want to let victims of crime know that they are not alone.
Commemorating 50 years of Victim Assistance
The Crime Victims’ Rights Act of 2004 (CVRA) increased victim involvement in the federal criminal justice system by guaranteeing them certain basic rights, such as the right to be informed of any court proceedings or parole proceedings, the right to speak at public court proceedings, and the right to confer with the government attorney assigned to their case. But the most fundamental right that it enumerated was the “right to be treated with fairness and with respect for the victim’s dignity and privacy.” By recognizing the essential humanity of victims and expanding their role in the criminal justice system, the CVRA helped restore power to survivors who often feel powerless in the aftermath of a serious crime. Since the CVRA became law, evidence has accumulated that what justice means to victims often differs from what justice means in the traditional context of the law. A study published by the Urban Institute in 2018, for instance, asked 80 survivors of sex and labor trafficking and 100 human trafficking stakeholders in 8 cities across the country for their definition of justice; only 24 percent of respondents defined it punitively, as incarceration. And a national survey conducted by the Alliance for Safety and Justice found that 61 percent of the 800 crime survivors polled supported more spending on prevention and rehabilitation rather than long prison sentences.
Whatever form justice takes within the criminal justice system, fulfilling victims’ needs regarding justice requires that their voices be reflected and respected not only in the justice system process, but also in the care and support they receive after the crime has taken place. Survivors must have agency and choice in their interactions with law enforcement, service providers, and health and judicial professionals. And they need a seamless continuum of support to heal from the trauma they suffered. Helping victims find their personal justice is thus a communitywide, holistic, and ongoing effort. The Office for Victims of Crime (OVC), part of the Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs, is leaning into that effort by identifying creative and innovative ways of expanding access to victim services and increasing service options available to crime victims so that they and their families can choose the services and support systems that best meet their needs. For instance, OVC’s TeleSAFE program is expanding access to Sexual Assault Forensic Examiners (SANE) through telehealth technology. Victims in rural, tribal, and remote communities that lack SANE nurses will now have access to safe, trauma-informed examinations following an assault. OVC is also funding a national center for increasing access to victim services and compensation in areas that have been historically marginalized and adversely impacted by inequality. Closer to home, Victims United Inc, Family Resource, VIDVSAC and Women's Coalition of St. Croix are some of our local organizations, programs, or resources that are improving victim access to services and victim service options. The victims’ rights movement that gained national attention with the President’s Task Force on Victims of Crime and was strengthened by the CVRA transformed our criminal justice system by creating space for victims’ voices. The success of the movement now will be judged by how closely we listen to victims’ voices, both inside and outside the courtroom, and the doors we collectively open to help them find the justice they desperately seek.
The Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) leads communities throughout the country in their annual observances of NCVRW by promoting victims’ rights and honoring crime victims and those who advocate on their behalf. This year’s theme—Rights, access, equity, for all victims— spotlights victim service organizations’ best practices to reach all victims and help them forge new healing pathways.
For additional information about this year’s NCVRW and how to assist crime victims in your own community, please contact Victims United Inc at 340-642-5204 or email us at iktcf-vu.org/contact us. For additional ideas on how to support all victims of crime, visit OVC’s website at www.ovc.ojp.gov.
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