NCVLI remains on the frontlines of victims' rights protection as crime victims are forced to navigate the shifting legal reality during the COVID-19 pandemic.  This presentation will identify the key victims’ rights impacted by some of the justice system’s COVID-19 responses across the country and review legal strategies that individual victims’ attorneys and NCVLI are employing to help protect victims' rights in the current landscape.

presented by

Meg Garvin & Amy Liu

Enhancing fairness and justice for victims requires a process of social change built on a balanced approach of legal advocacy, training & education, and public policy. 2020 marks 20 years since NCVLI began advancing victims' rights through that approach. 

How do we seek justice for a client whose competency is questioned from the beginning? Due to their vulnerability, children have special rights in legal proceedings.

presented by

Yvonne Chin, Senior Staff Attorney, & Riddhi Mukhopadhyay, Legal Director, Sexual Violence Law Center

Legal professionals can work in myriad ways and venues to create space for crime victims' rights in their jurisdictions.  This presentation will discuss promising strategies for victims' rights attorneys and advocates to interact with judges and others inside and outside of the courtroom.

This training will provide a comprehensive guide to serving crime victim clients who are in the LGBTQ+ community and come to legal services providers for assistance with related legal issues.  Attendees can expect to learn a brief cultural competency piece coupled with substantive legal protections that exist to aid advocates in serving their clients.

presented by

Shary Sanchez, Esq. & Sarah Filcher, Esq.

In this training, Kazi Houston, Legal Director at the Rocky Mountain Victim Law Center, will discuss the importance of restitution requests to many victims and survivors, creative approaches to restitution requests, and ideas for how to collaborate with other service providers to help compile documentation for victim-centered restitution requests.

presented by

Kazi Houston, MSW, JD, Legal Director, Rocky Mountain Victim Law Center

Multi-victim criminal cases present many challenges for an individual crime victim's attorney. Ensuring and enforcing your individual client's rights can be difficult when a few or many victims are named in a criminal case

presented by

Steven J. Kelly, Esq.

The interests of victims are best served when victims’ attorneys and prosecutors understand one another. This training will cover the sometimes competing legal and ethical obligations that prosecutors must uphold in their pursuit of justice for victims, the defendant and the government.

presented by

Katharine Manning, President and Founder of Blackbird LLC, and Sarah McClellan, Assistant U.S. Attorney

Prosecutors hold the unique position of “Minister of Justice” in our criminal justice system.  As such, they have an ethical duty to seek justice and to treat all parties – from defendants to victims - fairly.  But prosecutors are human, and thus susceptible to the influences of both implicit and confirmation bias. 

presented by

Elizabeth Ortiz

Gang Controlled Sexual Exploitation is the sale of sex by a criminal street enterprise. While Gang Controlled Sexual Exploitation has been an on-going epidemic, there has been a struggle to identify and treat these victims.

presented by

Deepa Patel, CSOTP, LCSW