Multimedia List

Herman Millholland is an independent consultant with more than 22 years of comprehensive management experience specializing in criminal justice and victim services initiatives. As a consultant and national victim advocate, Mr. Millholland uses his strategic planning, financial management, board and fund development, and training and technical assistance experience to provide guidance and advice on public policy matters.

Aswad Thomas is a community organizer, crime victim advocate, public safety policy expert, and a survivor of gun violence. Throughout his career, Mr. Thomas has brought unprecedented awareness of the unique and urgent needs of victims who are most impacted by crime and violence but who have been historically underserved, with a focus on addressing unaddressed trauma.

Elijah Lee is a 16-year-old, and a national advocate for children. His activism started at the age of 10 years old, as he led his first child abuse awareness march, where he rallied the community and educated others about its prevalence. Elijah founded a nonprofit organization, Hear Our Voices, in 2021, dedicated to empowering young people with an emphasis on assisting youth to find their voices and become agents of change.

Angela McCown is director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) Victim Services Division (VSD), has more than 30 years of experience in the victim services field, and has helped hundreds of thousands crime victims participate in the criminal justice system and thousands of the professionals who serve them. Under Ms. McCown’s direction, the TDCJ VSD has implemented a variety of innovative strategies and programs to better meet the needs of crime victims.

Michelle Ballan is a Professor and Associate Dean for Research at the School of Social Welfare; Professor of Family, Population and Preventive Medicine at Renaissance School of Medicine; Research Director for the Stony Brook Early Childhood Clinic; and Director of the Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and related Disabilities (LEND) Center at Stony Brook University. Her research and practice focus on the identification and amelioration of barriers impacting the health and well-being of individuals with disabilities and their families. Her groundbreaking work has led to one of the largest respondent surveys of women with spinal cord injury who have previously experienced violence.

Joan Meunier-Sham is the director of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health’s Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) Program and is responsible for the statewide delivery of acute adult and adolescent SANE services in 52 Massachusetts hospitals, and the delivery of Pediatric SANE services in 10 of the state’s 12 Children’s Advocacy Centers. She was also the co-director of the National TeleNursing Center (NTC), a pilot project funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office for Victims of Crime. In this pioneering project, expert SANEs at the NTC used telehealth technology to provide 24/7 “real time” support and guidance to clinicians conducting forensic examinations for adult and adolescent sexual assault patients in underserved communities.

The Hope Research Center partners with service organizations to develop, test, and implement a trauma-informed and hope-centered framework to improve outcomes for victims and their families. This research also examines hope as a protective factor against burnout, secondary traumatic stress, and turnover among service providers. The Center offers hope research strategies, including evaluations and applied research projects customized to the needs of an organization and focused on improving program services and achieving client outcomes.

Jocelyn Mejia is a social worker with the Imperial County Department of Social Services, Children and Families Division in California. She has worked in child welfare for 8 years, and currently works on complex and Indian Child Welfare Act cases in Imperial County, a border community in a rural area adjoining Mexico, the State of Arizona, three California counties, and a Tribal reservation. Ms. Mejia has been instrumental in ensuring that the youngest victims of crime are treated with love, respect, and care.

During the briefing, Director Rose shared information about 2024 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week commemoration events, the Crime Victims Fund, and more!

This 2024 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week (NCVRW) theme video is a call-to-action for us all to create safe environments for crime victims to share what happened to them. By doing so, we’re able to offer support, options for life-saving services, and, most importantly, hope. Use this video during your 2024 NCVRW events or share it throughout the year on your website and social media channels, or at public awareness, education, and training events to advance victims’ rights and services.

This 2024 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week (NCVRW) theme video is a call-to-action for us all to create safe environments for crime victims to share what happened to them. By doing so, we’re able to offer support, options for life-saving services, and, most importantly, hope. Use this video during your 2024 NCVRW events or share it throughout the year on your website and social media channels, or at public awareness, education, and training events to advance victims’ rights and services.

Learn about obligations as a federal grant award recipient pertaining to civil rights compliance requirements as it relates to language access as well as the enforcement authority of the Office of Justice Programs’ Office for Civil Rights.

During the briefing, Director Rose shared more about OVC’s site visit to Puerto Rico and discussed the President’s Budget for Fiscal Year 2025 and its impact on the Crime Victims Fund.

This OVC webinar provides guidance for reporting on the required performance measures for Tribal Victim Services Set-Aside Program grantees. Members of OVC’s performance management team provide an overview of performance reporting requirements, processes for accessing the Performance Measurement Tool system, entering quarterly performance measures, generating the semiannual PDF report, completing semiannual MMIP measures and submitting semiannual performance reports in JustGrants, along with additional resources.

Learn about obligations as a federal grant award recipient pertaining to civil rights compliance requirements as well as the enforcement authority of the Office of Justice Programs’ Office for Civil Rights.

Learn about training and technical assistance (TTA) available to all OVC anti-trafficking grantees on Legal Support, Labor Trafficking, Survivor Engagement, and Economic Empowerment. TTA providers will share details on the resources and assistance they can provide and how to access these services.

During the briefing, Director Rose provided updates about the proposed Rule to enhance the federal crime victim compensation program, the 2024 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week events, a new career opportunity, a recent site visit to Puerto Rico, the status of the Crime Victims Fund, and more.

OVC invited Tribal leaders, representatives, and stakeholders to participate in a Consultation on the Tribal Set-Aside from the Crime Victims Fund for Fiscal Year 2024. Attendees discussed proposed changes regarding the administration of funds, the use of funds, and the application process. This is the recorded webinar of the first day of the 2-day consultation.

OVC invited Tribal leaders, representatives, and stakeholders to participate in a Consultation on the Tribal Set-Aside from the Crime Victims Fund for Fiscal Year 2024. Attendees discussed proposed changes regarding the administration of funds, the use of funds, and the application process. This is the recorded webinar of the second day of the 2-day consultation.

This recorded webinar helps Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) Developing Future Victim Specialists to Serve American Indian/Alaska Native Victims of Crime grantees understand their performance measurement reporting requirements.

Sergio’s Story describes the experience of a young boy who was a victim of labor trafficking and is part of a federal case. This video been developed from the graphic novel and the accompanying audiobook and is a compilation of all videos in the Sergio’s Story playlist.

In this fourth segment of Sergio’s Story, we discover what support, including the resources available to victims, and court proceedings for labor trafficking cases can look like.

The third segment of Sergio’s Story focuses on working conditions individuals may encounter in labor trafficking situations and some of the fears victims have about coming forward.

Watch the second segment of Sergio’s Story in which we continue to learn about labor trafficking warning signs and the impact this crime has on youth victims.