Jeannette M. Adkins | 2021 National Crime Victims' Service Awards Tribute Video

JEANNETTE ADKINS: Many crime victims that I worked with over my 32-year career found justice in this courtroom. They found the words on the stained-glass window here to be true.  Policy impacts the pursuit of justice significantly. I created a victim witness program in the prosecutor's office herein Greene County in 1982, because there were no general victim services available. 

TERI LAJEUNESSE: She was eager to share policy, procedure, program material so essentially other programs would not have to completely reinvent the wheel. 

JEANNETTE ADKINS: We didn't have a domestic violence law then. We didn't have a specific law for crime victims. We worked to actually implement many of those laws that changed everything for crime victims. I went through the Police Academy and actually became a special deputy with our Sheriff's Department. In 1996, we created the Ohio Crisis Response team to fill a void that many of us in the victim advocacy field were recognizing. 

DAVID HAYES: When you have best practices in place, because of those standards and procedures, then you can rest assured that the victim is getting the best services that they can. 

JEANNETTE ADKINS: When I became the executive director of the National Organization for Victim Assistance, we developed the National Advocate Credentialing Program, which today has credentialed nearly 10,000 advocates across the country. The Department of Defense decided to develop a program to almost mirror the National Advocate Credentialing Program. 

The DoD Sexual Assault Advocacy Program was born. And that program has credentialed nearly 100,000 advocates in the military around the world. Advocates serving crime victims and building trust with them comes from their own professionalization, their own education and their own pursuit of justice for those that they're serving.