COOPER AND OTHER STATE AGS URGE CONGRESS TO PROTECT FUNDS TO FIGHT
CRIME, HELP VICTIMS

Fund Assists Nearly Four Million Crime Victims Nationwide

RALEIGH -- Attorney General Roy Cooper joined fellow attorneys
general from 51 other states and territories April 28, to urge
Congress not to slash more than $1.4 billion from programs that fight
crime and help crime victims.

"Law enforcement battling crime and drugs in communities across our
state and country need more help, not less," said Cooper. "And crime
victims and their families will suffer again if these cuts go
through, cuts to programs that require criminals to pay to alleviate
some of the hurt they've caused."

Cooper and other Attorneys General wrote to Congress to express
concerns about cuts to grants that help state and local law
enforcement fight drugs and violence.

The Byrne Justice Assistance Grant program, which helped fund law
enforcement efforts to seize more than 54,000 weapons from criminals
and shut down more than 5,600 methamphetamine labs in 2004, would be
elminated under current budget proposals.

The Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program, which helps
put officers on the street in communities across the country, would
be slashed by 74 percent. "These law enforcement cuts could not have
come at a worse time," the letter says, pointing out that "estates
and territories are reeling from the explosion in heroin,
prescription narcotic, and methamphetamine abuse."

The proposed cuts to the Federal Crime Victims Fund "would have a
devastating impact on our ability to support victims of crime," the
Attorneys Generals said in their letter. The Federal Crime Victims
Fund was created by the Victims of Crime Act of 1984 (VOCA). VOCA
funds come entirely from wrongdoers through federal criminal fines,
forfeitures and special assessments a€" not from taxpayers.

Through grants to state victim compensation programs, victims of
violent crimes throughout the country have been able to get help for
medical care, mental health counseling, funeral and burial expenses,
and other vital services.

In North Carolina, these funds help support domestic violence
shelters, rape crisis centers, counseling for victims, assistance for
crime victims who must testify in court, and many other programs that
advocate for victims. "Some 4,400 local programs depend on VOCA
assistance grants to provide necessary services to nearly 4 million
victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, child abuse, drunk
driving, elder abuse and robberies, as well as families of homicide
victims and other victims of crime," said the Attorneys' General
letter to Congress. "No victim of crime should be left without the
means to overcome the horrific acts committed against them."

The appeal to Congress comes during National Crime Victims' Rights Month.

A copy of the letter is available at www.ncdoj.com .
Source: NC Department of Justice.