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1 min read Bail

Crime Survivors Speak Out: Where has all the Funding Gone?

In a recent powerful opinion piece, longtime victim advocate, Patricia Wenskunas of Crime Survivors, argues that funding originally intended to support real crime victims is quietly disappearing
Crime Survivors Speak Out: Where has all the Funding Gone?

In a recent powerful opinion piece, longtime victim advocate, Patricia Wenskunas of Crime Survivors, argues that funding originally intended to support real crime victims is quietly disappearing. Instead, hundreds of millions of dollars from major foundations and government grants are being redirected to organizations that primarily serve defendants, offenders, and convicted criminals. These groups are often framed as helping “victims of the system,” “victims of mass incarceration,” or “victims of poverty,” while survivors of homicide, sexual assault, domestic violence, and other violent crimes are increasingly left without support.

Wenskunas highlights the devastating, measurable consequences of this ideological shift: victim service organizations are closing programs, trauma counseling waitlists are growing longer, compensation funds for medical bills and funeral expenses are drying up, and survivors are forced to face court alone while their offenders are released on personal recognizance bonds. She describes this not as a funding shortage, but as a deliberate reallocation that inverts the moral order of justice by treating the offender as the primary “victim.”

The piece ends with a strong call to action, urging foundations, lawmakers, and criminal justice leaders to stop equating defendant services with victim services. The advocate emphasizes that real crime victims did not create the system’s problems, they are the ones paying the price for them and demands that funding be restored to the people who truly need it most. An excerpt from the article is below as well as a link to the full article.

When Criminals Became the “Victims”: The Quiet Defunding of Crime Victims' Services

By Patricia Wenskunas
Crime Survivors Journal

As a victim advocate who has spent more than two decades standing beside survivors of homicide, sexual assault, domestic violence, and other violent crimes, I have watched something deeply disturbing unfold in the criminal justice world.

The very funding that was created to help real crime victims is disappearing, and it is being deliberately redirected to organizations that primarily serve defendants, offenders, and convicted criminals. READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE>>>

Published by:

Eric Granof

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