State, hospital aid violence victims
BY CARMEN McCOLLUM
cmccollum@nwitimes.com
219.662.5337 | Saturday, January 26, 2008
GARY | Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter said Friday he has stepped up his office's efforts to assist victims of domestic violence.
More than 75 lives were lost to domestic violence and more than 8,000 women and children were served in emergency shelters in Indiana last year, Carter said during a visit to the Methodist Hospitals Northlake Campus in Gary.
Carter joined hospital officials and local shelter directors to bring attention to the outreach program dubbed Address Confidentiality.
The address confidentiality law, enacted in 2001, allows individuals with protective orders in place to maintain confidential addresses through the attorney general's office. It means that people who participate will have their first class mail sent to secured substitute addresses without fear of discovery, then forwarded to their new homes.
Carter said victims of domestic abuse will have to be willing to move to keep their new addresses confidential.
Carter said Methodist Hospital and other hospitals across the state will be instrumental in getting the information about the program to victims of domestic abuse by passing out brochures to patients.
In Lake County alone, 12 to 15 lives were lost as a result of domestic violence last year, said Lisa Wein, executive director of Haven House. Just a few years ago, the county posted 26 deaths because of domestic violence, Wein said.
Lake County Deputy Prosecutor Peter Villarreal also joined Carter, introducing a new domestic violence advocate who began working for the office this month.
Villarreal said Erin Bonaventura, a 2007 graduate of Calumet College, will devote her time to victims of domestic violence in Lake County. Bonaventura is a niece to Lake Juvenile Judge Mary Beth Bonaventura.
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