 The Office for Victims of Crime is committed to enhancing the nation's capacity to assist crime victims and to providing leadership in changing attitudes, policies, and practices to promote justice and healing for all victims of crime. Points of view expressed in this video do not represent the official position of the United States Department of Justice. In an unprecedented action, John Gillis, the director of the Office for Victims of Crime, traveled around the United States to meet with crime victims first hand to discuss their experiences with the criminal justice system. A series of roundtable meetings were held in nine states, with 30 states represented and over 300 participants. After careful analysis of the informative and heartfelt opinions expressed, there were certain areas of consistency that emerged. The issues focused on both the problems that exist in the criminal justice system and the needed remedies from the perspective of crime victims. This program series captures and reflects some of the key findings of the roundtable discussions. The series includes a total of five thematic videos on topics ranging from the financial impact of crime on victims, to victim notification and basic case information. The opinions expressed are emblematic of many of the participants and is a way in which the Office for Victims of Crime has given a voice to victims. So the one way that I feel that we need to find out how we help you is by going out and meeting with people outside the Beltway, going out and talking with crime victims, meeting the individuals at the grassroots level who are doing the work and who are doing it for the right reasons, not because they're being paid but because they care about what they're doing. So I want to use this as an opportunity to find out from you how we can best help you at the grassroots level, how we can best do some of the things that will help you get through the tragedies that you've all suffered. When my wife and I experienced our tragedy, it happened so suddenly with the phone call and that was the basic response that most of the friends in San Antonio who are surviving victims and who are perpetual victims have apparently since is that the shocking experience that they have initially is mummifying, so to speak. They can't think, they can't reason, they can't see straight, they suffer physically and emotionally, mentally. So therefore their basic rationale as a normal human being no longer exists. Finally I got through the Waterbury Police Department and it took me several transfers to I got to Chief of Detectives who said to me, your daughter's been murdered just like that. And then she heard it and she went crazy as you would imagine and the only thing the guy would say was shut your wife up, shut your wife up, I have to give you the details. So that was our first encounter with the criminal justice system. Come to the house and found a note on the door. Now the note suggested that I call the police and it gave me a number and it did say regarding my daughter, well when I and so I thought maybe she had done something and the police had picked her up and maybe she needed someone to come down to the police station and pick her up. But in fact when I called the number that the police had given me I actually got the morgue. In terms of notification of my daughter's death she was murdered in a city over 100 miles from where I lived and they did not call me on the phone and tell me they called the Madison Police Department and sent an officer to tell me and I will be forever grateful for that. It was a Saturday morning I answered the phone I was holding my 11 month old granddaughter and a voice said are you the mother of Bill Austin and I said yes and he said he's been shot and I said my god where is he my first instinct was I was running to a hospital and the voice said oh he's in the morgue and so that was my first experience and I'll carry that to my grave but we really really need to train policemen on how to notify and if they can't they need to take a professional with them that can. Opportunity to teach for four units for one year police officers about notifying victims survivors and it was very interesting because they don't know how to do it they are afraid of our tears and they really needed to be educated they had funding for one year four sessions and higher up than the bottom said no that is something that is not needed the survivors just have to be told any way they could get the information in our area a lot of the information is given over the television before you've been notified even by a phone call. When we call my daughter called to find out what was going on in our case in the beginning they had held a preliminary hearing in our case and they did not notify us as the family because they said they didn't think we would be interested. My husband was murdered and they playboy and I never did when you throw it into the justice system don't know nothing you said now they talked in Dutch to you. The man that murdered our daughter was declared not guilty by recent insanity he was initially judged incompetent to stand trial and then he was judged to be not guilty by recent insanity we were not advised of any of these proceedings we didn't have anything explained to us we called the prosecutor's office one week and we were told oh last week we accepted the insanity please all over he'll be in a mental institution the rest of his life we had been calling the prosecutor's office regularly and we have this documented and at no time did they volunteer anything to us well we were upset about not being included but felt pretty good while he's going to be in a mental institution the rest of his life about six months later we called our prosecutor's office and we said we'd like to know what's going on oh let us check oh there's going to be a hearing a day after tomorrow for him to be released in the community would you like to be attended we weren't notified of any proceedings in our case at all the night of the death notification of our son we of course were in shock so we didn't know what questions to ask but we did ask where is she will she be arrested what for what happens next I don't think he told us that there would be a early first appearance with the judge because the next morning at 8 before 8 30 there was a hearing that I saw on the news at 25 after 8 and there she was with her attorney and she was released on bond and so you know that was a shock for us because I believe he should have told us you know about it but we didn't know to ask so I feel that if you don't know the questions to ask then you don't get any answers really didn't understand the procedures and that if I know that I didn't have I could have pushed to have a trial I would rather went to I do thank you for taking the time to spend with us today I wish you didn't have to do it I wish we were here under different circumstances because none of us chose to have a tragedy happen in our lives but now that it has happened let's see that we can see if we can take advantage of that and try and help others who have to follow so that they don't have to suffer the same pain that we've suffered so thank you the following is a summary of the key points made during this program it is important that victims receive notice about case proceedings in order to exercise their rights victim death notification is extremely important and needs to be done more sensitively training in this area is critical to avoiding further damage being done to the surviving family members truth in sentencing is a critical issue to crime victims there needs to be better assistance to provide information to families who have suffered a violent crime about the existing organizations that can help them information about the crime is critical to the well-being of crime victims OVC is funding the federal victim notification system which provides victims with critical information about case proceedings the officer victims of crime has funded the development of training curricula and other resources to improve death notification among criminal justice and allied professionals OVC provided funding to mothers against drunk driving to develop and deliver training for clergy and funeral directors crime victim advocates law enforcement and medical personnel to instruct these professionals in providing compassionate and thorough death notification OVC provided funding to the American College of Emergency Physicians to collaborate with mad to train emergency physicians and residents to give proper death notification to families after the loss of a loved one OVC has developed the online directory of crime victim services to provide information about available resources and assistance for more information please visit the following website