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“TRIBUTE TO JOHN GILLIS” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the Senate section on pages S4302 on April 10, 2007.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
TRIBUTE TO JOHN GILLIS
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, National Crime Victims Rights Week will soon be celebrated. I would like to compliment John Gillis, the director of the Office of Victims of Crime at the Department of Justice, for his outstanding work on behalf of crime victims. I ask to have printed in the Record a column I wrote about Mr. Gillis.
The material follows.
Honoring Director John Gillis
(By U.S. Senator Jon Kyl)
Each April for the past 26 years, the Nation has observed National Crime Victims Rights Week. This is a time when the country recognizes the harm suffered by millions of Americans at the hands of criminals and calls for additional ways to support victims in their struggle for justice.
This year I'd like to use this week to praise the leadership of John W. Gillis, the Director of the Justice Department's Office for Victims of Crime (OVC). During his long and distinguished law-enforcement career--including two decades with the Los Angeles Police Department and a stint as chair of the California Board of Prison Terms--Mr. Gillis has fought tirelessly on behalf of crime victims.
Mr. Gillis experienced personal tragedy in 1979 when gang members murdered his daughter Louarna as part of a targeted killing of children of police officers.
This horrific tragedy compelled him to help found the Justice for Homicide Victims and the Coalition of Victims Equal Rights, an organization that works for the rights of victims and their families. He also founded Victims and Friends United and has been an active member of Memory of Victims Everywhere and Parents of Murdered Children, a support group for families of homicide victims.
The President nominated Mr. Gillis to become Director of OVC in 2001, and I was honored to lead his nomination through the Senate. Since the beginning of his tenure, he has transformed the OVC into an organization that truly puts victims first.
Through his ``victims first'' focus, he helped provide the inspiration for the Scott Campbell, Stephanie Roper, Wendy Preston, Louarna Gillis, Nila Lynn Crime Victims Rights Act of 2004, named in part after his daughter, which Senator Dianne Feinstein and I cosponsored, and which extends meaningful and enforceable rights to federal crime victims for the first time in our Nation's history.
To ensure that these new rights will be enforced through our courts, Mr. Gillis has supported the National Crime Victim Law Institute and new clinics across the country; such as the one here in Arizona, established by Arizona Voice for Crime Victims, which provided the first model in the Nation. These clinics provide free legal and social services to victims of crime who seek to be treated with the respect and dignity that they deserve. Congress has followed the example Mr. Gillis set by providing critically needed resources to support these efforts beginning in 2006, and we are committed to continue expanding them.
Under his leadership, OVC created the Helping Outreach Programs to Expand (HOPE) grant program to help fund grassroots victim service organizations that have had difficulty in obtaining public funding through other sources. In 2002, 376 programs received over $1.8 million to support its development efforts, and, in 2007, the HOPE program will continue to develop and expand the use of grassroots service providers to help expand outreach to victims.
OVC has reached out to the Native American communities where the highest rates of violent crime occur. It increased funding for services to victims and expanded eligibility for this funding to include tribes not under federal jurisdiction. In 2005, OVC funded approximately $8.5 million for projects serving Native American crime victims, and, in 2006, it increased discretionary funding to $3.5 million for the Tribal Victim Assistance Program, allowing 30 tribes to develop direct services to victims of violent crime.
OVC also recently announced the availability of an online application for the International Terrorism Victim Expense Reimbursement Program, which is intended to reimburse victims for allowable expenses incurred as a result of acts of terrorism occurring outside the United States. Additionally, under OVC's Antiterrorism and Emergency Assistance Program, OVC provided assistance to jurisdictions to support the response to incidents of mass violence on school campuses.
This Crime Victims Rights Week, we should not only honor crime victims and those affected by crime, but think about new ways to help and support victims in their struggle for justice. The examples that I've cited are only a few of Mr. Gillis's accomplishments as OVC director that will help those seeking justice. And, I am proud to have someone like Mr. Gillis guiding these efforts. His service to the President and to crime victims is a credit to our country.
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