Honor crime victims and their advocates

The week of April 10-16 is National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, a time to honor victims and the advocates of victims’ rights. This year’s theme, “Reshaping the Future, Honoring the Past,” evokes victims’ past struggles and our duty to help them rebuild.

After a crime, victims need to know what rights and resources they can count on. We are proud that in Kane County, victims of violent crimes find the help they need.

For victim advocates, reshaping the future, particularly in these financially stressed times, means finding ways to do more with less.

Honoring the past means recalling a time when victims had no voice in the criminal justice system — when murder victims’ families were excluded from courtrooms and assault victims paid their own medical bills.

National Crime Victims’ Rights Week honors the victims and advocates who confronted such injustices and helped produce a nationwide system of victim compensation and victims’ rights.

Crime victims are not limited to violent crimes. Our office employs 12 victim advocates to help victims of a variety of crimes and help people from becoming victims in the first place.

These advocates guide crime victims through the criminal process and provide outreach and connections to outside agencies that can assist specific needs, such as domestic violence shelters, rape crisis centers, senior services, police departments and hospitals.

Our office will always make every effort to defend and advocate for crime victims. We must put a face on every case and adhere to the Victims’ Bill of Rights, not because we are bound to do so, but because it is the right thing to do.

For info on National Crime Victims’ Rights Week and ideas on how to serve victims of crimes in Kane County, call Judy Bland, director of our office’s Victims’ Rights Unit, at (630) 232-3500.

For info on resources to help crime victims, visit illinoisattorneygeneral.gov.

Joseph H. McMahon

Kane County State’s Attorney