NCVLI's Meg Garvin and Terry Campos, who combined have 35 years experience in victims' rights, will review key developments and lessons learned in victims' rights from cases decided across the country in 2022. Building on these, they will look ahead and identify how these lessons can inform litigation and policy development in 2023.

presented by

Meg Garvin & Terry Campos, NCVLI

State rules of professional conduct limit when attorneys and certain non-attorneys with whom they work can communicate directly with crime victims who are represented by counsel. This training explores these limitations in the context of victims’ rights law and practice. NCVLI will provide a brief overview of the scope and application of no-contact rules to communications with represented victims. Two experienced victims’ rights attorneys – Jamie Balson from Legal Services for Crime Victims in Arizona and Mariam El-menshawi from California Victims Legal Resource Center – will then share their experiences with, and practice tips for, navigating no-contact rules while also facilitating victims' access to their rights.

presented by

Susie Cowen, National Crime Victim Law Institute & Jamie Balson, Crime Victims' Rights Attorney, Legal Services for Crime Victims in Arizona

In 2014 Congress codified the Special Victims’ Counsel programs mandating that certain victims of certain offenses would be detailed an attorney to represent those victims throughout the pendency of military justice proceedings. Free attorneys for victims – a groundbreaking idea. These counsel transformed military justice and placed victims in the ring of the trial. However, provision of counsel to victims has led to unintended realities. This presentation will discuss those unintended realities, covering judicial orders of coercion to waive rights, judicial orders to victims counsel to enforce orders, and orders to victims counsel to shepherd evidence. Providing victims detailed counsel seemed like a Panacea, but was it?

presented by

Devon Wells, Chief, Appellate and Outreach Department of the Air Force Victims’ Counsel Division