Vera’s Center on Victimization and Safety (CVS) works with government and nonprofit organizations to enhance efforts to prevent and address interpersonal violence and related crimes, including domestic violence and sexual assault. The center specializes in fostering cross-disciplinary collaboration and promoting policies and practices that hold abusers accountable, prioritize safety, and also help survivors heal. By combining staff expertise and skills with the practical knowledge of professionals in the field, it provides technical assistance and guidance that is timely, relevant, and reflective of current best practices.
Language access means ensuring that people who have limited or no English language proficiency or are Deaf or hard of hearing are able to access information, programs, and services at a level equal to English-proficient hearing people. Providing language access to incarcerated victims of sexual abuse honors their humanity and worth in the wake of a ...
People who have been incarcerated are also often survivors of violence—harm that may have happened to them before, during, or after their time behind bars. Yet, for many, the shame and stigma of being labeled “offenders” often eclipses the less visible but painful reality of their experiences of violence. We are proud to release a new report that ...
Reaching and Serving Crime Victims Who Have a History of Incarceration
More than 2 million people are locked up in U.S. jails and prisons. Most were victims of crime before they were incarcerated, and many experience victimization during their incarceration or once they return home. But regardless of when their victimization occurred, the vast majority of survivors who have previously been incarcerated do not get the ...
A Review of the Literature on Police-based and Other First Response Models
The Vera Institute of Justice (Vera) launched Serving Safely in May 2018 as a national initiative to improve police responses to people with serious mental illnesses (SMI) and intellectual/developmental disabilities (I/DD). The initiative’s Research and Evaluation Committee developed this literature review as a first step toward creating a research ...
Vera’s Center on Victimization and Safety developed this tip sheet to provide basic information on some government means-tested benefit programs for people with disabilities, and to explain the potential effects that receiving compensation may have on these benefits. The tip sheet also guides readers to additional resources for people with disabili ...
While people with disabilities make up nearly one-fifth of the U.S. population, they remain largely invisible to society at large, and victim response systems in particular. And despite growing public awareness of violent victimization, it excludes the victimization of people with disabilities, who are at particular risk of serious violent crime, i ...
Amy had both a personal and professional commitment to social justice, access, and inclusion. She was actively involved in her Madison community and was a dedicated friend to many. The impact of her life’s work will live on in the countless people she has helped. Indeed, a foundational report she co-authored—entitled “How Safe are Americans with Di ...
On December 31, 2016, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) published a summary of changes to the rules governing how victim service agencies can use Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) assistance funds. The rule changes, which went into effect in August 2016, dramatically expand the ways states and territories can use funds to ...
As October’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month comes to an end, we can reflect on how far we’ve come since the early 1970s—when shelters gave women the option to leave abusive partners, but separation was considered the only viable option. Today, women who experience domestic violence have Family Justice Centers, specialized domestic violence court ...
According to a 2014 newsletter on violence against women, “One of the most enduring realities of sexual assault is that very few cases result in arrest, prosecution, and conviction of [perpetrators]. Arrest, no less prosecution, is fairly unlikely, especially those in which the suspect is a stranger to the victim.” So it should have come as welcome ...
In the early hours of Sunday morning, a gunman murdered 49 people and injured another 53 at a shooting during Latin Night at Pulse, a gay nightclub, in Orlando, Florida. Forty-nine individuals, overwhelmingly people of color, whose lives were cut short in the very space considered to be a “refuge” or “haven” for the LGBTQ community. Later that day, ...
