The following post appears courtesy of Attorney General Eric Holder.

I am happy to tell you about an important upcoming event in the fight to prevent and reduce children’s exposure to violence in the United States.  Last month we established the Attorney General’s National Task Force on Children Exposed to Violence, composed of leading experts from diverse fields and perspectives.  The Task Force will spend the next year examining the extent and nature of the problem of childhood exposure to violence in the U.S. and identifying policies and promising practices to address it.

Now we are pleased to announce that the first hearing of the Defending Childhood Task Force will take place in Baltimore on November 29 – 30, at the University of Maryland law school.  Other hearings will be held over the next several months in Albuquerque, Miami and Detroit.  Look on the Defending Childhood Task Force website for details about the hearings and information about community listening sessions and other opportunities to give your input.

We expect these hearings to inform and guide the Defending Childhood Initiative’s work to ensure the safety and health of all our children.  In the past few years the Justice Department has been working with leading researchers to take an in-depth look at the problem of children exposed to violence, and what we learned has been a wake-up call, and warning bell, for all of us. We learned that the majority of our kids – more than 60 percent – have been exposed to crime, abuse, and violence — many in their own homes. Ten percent of children in the United States have suffered some form of abuse or neglect; one in sixteen has been victimized sexually. And both direct and indirect exposure to violence is having a profound negative impact on the mental and emotional development of young people across the country.

For me, this issue has been both a personal and professional concern for decades. As a judge, as a U.S. Attorney, and as the Deputy Attorney General, protecting children at risk and in need was at the forefront of my work. Today, as our nation’s Attorney General and as a parent, it remains a top priority.

For more information about the Defending Childhood Initiative, visit justice.gov/defendingchildhood.

This week, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced that in 2010 the U.S. homicide rate fell to 4.2 homicides per 100,000 residents, the lowest U.S. homicide rate in four decades.  

The new homicide statistics are part of a report by BJS: Homicide Trends in the United States, 1980-2008, which details homicide patterns and trends in the United States from 1980 to 2008. 

Overall, the U.S. has experienced a significant drop in the total homicide rate since 1980. In 1980, the U.S. homicide rate hovered at 10.2 per 100,000 residents, more than twice the current homicide rate. In the early 1980s, the homicide rate gradually fell for a few years but rose again beginning in the middle of the decade, peaking at an all-time high of 24,703 homicides in 1991. Since the homicide rate spiked in the early 1990s, it subsequently declined, reaching a four-decade low last year. 

Much of the decline in the nation’s homicide rate is due to a decrease in homicides occurring in large cities — defined as cities with at least 100,000 residents. Since 1980, 57.7 percent of homicides in the U.S. have occurred in large cities, and more than one third of those homicides occurred in the nation’s largest cities — defined as cities with at least 1 million residents. 

The BJS report shows that the largest cities experienced a dramatic decrease in homicide rates since 1980, which is a prominent factor in the total drop in the nation’s homicide rate. From 1991 to 2008, the homicide rate in the largest cities was cut by nearly two thirds, falling from 35.5 homicides per 100,000 residents in 1991 to 11.9 homicides per 100,000 residents in 2008.                                                                                                                            

In addition to mapping out homicide rates by year and region, the study paints a detailed picture of U.S. homicides by breaking down homicide numbers by a variety of other criteria including:

• Victim/Offender Relationship: More than 56 percent of homicide victims were acquaintances with the assailant.
• Weapon: Handgun-involved homicides increased in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and fell to a low in 2008.
• Circumstance: The number of homicides that occurred during the commission of another felony, such as a robbery or burglary, declined from about 5,300 homicides in 1991 to 2,600 homicides in 2000, then stabilized through 2008.                                                          

For more information about homicide trends over the last three decades, please visit the Bureau of Justice Statistics website and read the full report.

On Thursday, over 50 Department of Justice and federal government employees gathered at the department to observe the Transgender Day of Remembrance, a day to celebrate the courage and honor the memory of victims of anti-transgender discrimination and violence.  The keynote speaker was Diana Flynn, Chief of the Appellate Section of the Civil Rights Division, who offered a presentation about the ways in which the Civil Rights Division and other federal agencies have been working to end all forms of discrimination on the basis of gender, including gender identity and expression.

Other speakers included Robert Moossy of the Civil Rights Division’s Criminal Section, who spoke of the division’s efforts to investigate and prosecute gender-identity motivated violence under the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act; Becky Monroe, Acting Director of the Community Relations Service (CRS), who spoke about CRS’ work with communities affected by anti-transgender hate crimes; and Matt Nosanchuk, Senior Counselor the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Tom Perez.

Transgender individuals – meaning people whose gender identity or internal sense of being male or female is different from the gender marker assigned to them at birth – face enormous odds.  According to a recent survey by the National Center for Transgender Equality, discrimination against transgender individuals is pervasive: 63% of respondents said they had experienced a serious act of discrimination that had a major impact on their quality of life and ability to sustain themselves financially or emotionally.  As a result, transgender individuals are four times more likely to live in extreme poverty than the general population, and 41% reported attempting suicide.  They are also too often the target of violent crime, including murder.

Other than the Shepard-Byrd hate crimes statute, no federal law explicitly prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity.  Most federal laws, however, do prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, and the Civil Rights Division has been actively exploring ways in which the Department can use these laws to address discrimination against transgender individuals.  For example, the Civil Rights Division’s Education Section has participated in a number of cases involving the harassment of students because of their real or perceived failure to conform to sex stereotypes. (The division’s employees recently filmed a video for the It Gets Better project.)

Although the “sex stereotyping” theory is the most well-established avenue for securing protection for transgender people against discrimination, the Civil Rights Division is committed to exploring all viable arguments that can be made to ensure equality under the law for all people, irrespective of gender identity and expression. 

Moreover, under the authority of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, the Civil Rights Division has engaged in outreach to the transgender community to encourage it to seek help from law enforcement when hate crimes occur, and has helped train thousands of law enforcement officers on the new law and on the importance of responding to victims of anti-transgender violence.  The Division also documented violations of the civil rights of transgender individuals in its comprehensive findings letter from its investigation of the New Orleans Police Department.  When violence does occur, the Community Relations Service has worked with communities affected by that violence to build bridges – by facilitating communication and building trust – between those communities, with the goal of preventing future violence.

As our speakers reminded us, what is often lost in debates about transgender individuals and issues, is that transgender lives are human lives.  The Transgender Day of Remembrance is a day to recommit ourselves to breaking the cycle of discrimination and violence that affects far too many transgender Americans.

This post is part a series highlighting the department’s work with tribes in honor of American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month. For more information visit justice.gov/tribal.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona held a week-long course to train prosecutors from several of Arizona’s tribal governments so they may participate in the federal prosecution of offenders from their communities.  

The training kicks off the U.S. Attorney’s Office -Tribal Special Assistant United States Attorney (SAUSA) program.  This cross-commissioning is encouraged by the Tribal Law and Order Act and mandated by the District of Arizona’s Operational Plan for Public Safety in Indian Country.

Attorney General Holder has identified building and sustaining safe and secure tribal communities as one of the Department of Justice’s top priorities.  In June of 2009, the department launched a wide-ranging initiative to strengthen public safety in Indian Country and since that time, the department has taken a number of steps to deepen its commitment to tribal communities and to develop more effective partnership with tribal leaders, police, prosecutors, courts and advocates to combat crime in tribal communities.  The federal cross-commissioning of tribal prosecutors through the Tribal SAUSA program is just one way that U.S. Attorney’s Offices with Indian country jurisdiction are playing a crucial role in carrying out the department’s strategy through their own operational plans. 

The goal of the Tribal SAUSA program is to train eligible tribal prosecutors in federal law, procedure and investigative techniques to increase the likelihood that every viable criminal offense is prosecuted in tribal court, federal court or both.  The program also allows the tribal prosecutors to serve as co-counsel with federal prosecutors on felony investigations and prosecutions of offenses arising out of their respective tribal communities. After completing training, each tribal SAUSA will be assigned an experienced federal prosecutor assigned to the Violent Crime Section to serve as a mentor and co-counsel on their federal cases. 

The District of Arizona’s SAUSA program currently has 13 participants from 8 participating tribes – the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, the Gila River Indian Community, the Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation, the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, the Colorado River Indian Tribes, the Tohono O’odham Nation, the Hopi Tribe, and the White Mountain Apache Tribe –  and is expected to grow. 

Seven tribal prosecutors participated in the training course this week, which included classroom work and participation in proceedings before the federal court and grand jury. The remaining participants will attend an identical training planned for January 2012.

For more information about the department’s efforts related to tribal justice and safety, visit justice.gov/tribal.

This post appears courtesy of Dr. John H. Laub, Director of the National Institute for Justice (NIJ).

Last week, the National Institute of Justice released new findings which suggest that school-level interventions can significantly reduce dating violence among middle school students.

The study focused on the effectiveness of dating violence and sexual harassment prevention programs in 30 New York City public middle schools. When school-level interventions were implemented in the study, dating violence dropped by up to 50 percent. The findings suggest that a few low-cost initiatives could go a long way to reducing violence among young people.

While dating violence and harassment are typically thought of as problems affecting grown adults, it’s a real problem among young people and one that can have long-lasting consequences. In the last school year, nearly half of 7th through 12th graders said they experienced sexual harassment.

Physical injury, poor mental health, increased high-risk behavior, and increased school avoidance are all tied to dating violence and sexual harassment, which is why the Department of Justice has made it a priority to investigate initiatives that could reduce the prevalence of these life-altering crimes.

There are a number of varied programs across the country working to curb dating violence, but there has been a lack of scientific data supporting programs for middle school students. The NIJ’s study on middle school prevention programs is one of the only studies on the effectiveness of initiatives designed to reduce dating violence among 6th and 7th graders. We hope these findings will allow groups to better optimize their resources and improve the tools they’re using to prevent dating violence.

Relationships early in life can have a lasting impact on the maturation of young people, and the NIJ study is a hopeful sign that a few low-cost initiatives could go a long way to improving the lives of our young people and setting them up for a healthier future.

The multi-level, randomized trial found that:

• School-level interventions such as school-based “boundary agreements”, which are akin to restraining orders between students, and increased faculty and security presence in “hot spots” effectively reduced dating violence and sexual harassment — in some cases reducing dating violence by as much as 50 percent.  
• Combining these school-level interventions with a classroom-level intervention administered through a six-session curriculum also reduced sexual harassment.  
• Classroom-level interventions alone, which included instruction on state laws and penalties, consequences for perpetrators, and the construction of gender roles and healthy relationships, were not effective.

Other critical findings included:

• The combination of the classroom and school-level interventions and the school-level interventions alone led to a 32-47 percent reduction in peer sexual violence victimization and perpetration six months after the intervention was implemented.
• Students receiving the school-level intervention were more likely to intend to intervene as a bystander six months post-intervention.

Focus groups helped researchers understand how interventions were employed and received.  The groups confirmed that the interventions were straightforward to put in place, were implemented as planned, and were supported by teachers.

The possible implications of these results are substantial. The success of the school-level interventions is particularly important because these interventions can be implemented with very few extra costs to schools. Given the large size of the study (with more than 2,500 students) and the ethnic diversity of these students, these interventions may be successful among a broad range of populations.

This study was co-funded by the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools, U.S. Department of Education. 

For more information, download the full study (PDF) from NIJ.

This post is part a series highlighting the department’s work with tribes in honor of American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month. For more information visit justice.gov/tribal.

The Civil Rights Division is responsible for enforcing federal laws that protect the rights of American Indians and Alaska Natives, including laws that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability, religion and membership in a language minority group. 

These federal laws prohibit discrimination in education, employment, credit, housing, public accommodations, voting, state and local government services, and in certain federally-funded and conducted programs, among other areas.  The division also prosecutes actions under several criminal civil rights laws designed to protect personal liberties and safety.

 During American Indian and Alaska Native heritage month we are proud to highlight work that has protected American Indians and Alaska Natives.

President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder have made the prosecution of hate crimes a top priority. The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009 (HCPA) expanded the division’s ability to prosecute violence motivated by animus toward American Indians because of their race, national origin or color.  Working with U.S. Attorney’s Offices, the Civil Rights Division has prosecuted civil rights crimes victimizing Native Americans through sex trafficking, hate crimes and police brutality. 

In United States v. Beebe, Sanford, and Hatch (PDF), three defendants pleaded guilty in June and August 2011 for their roles in a racially-motivated assault on a 22-year-old Navajo man with a developmental disability.  Their indictment constituted the first time anyone had been charged with violating the HCPA. 

The Civil Rights Division also enforces the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act that protects the religious exercise of persons confined to institutions covered by the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act, including Native American religious beliefs and practices.

In April 2011, the division filed a statement of interest in Limbaugh v. Thompson (PDF), challenging a requirement by the Alabama Department of Corrections that male inmates cut their hair short.  The plaintiffs are adherents to Native American religious practices that mandate that hair be worn long, particularly during a time of mourning.

The Civil Rights Division enforces the civil rights of Native Americans to participate in all parts of the electoral process, including voter registration, running for office, and exercising the right to vote.

Last year, the division signed a memorandum of agreement (PDF) with Shannon County in South Dakota to remedy alleged violations of the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act.  The agreement provides for a comprehensive Lakota Election Information Program to ensure that election information and materials are translated and disseminated orally in Lakota in a timely manner. It also ensures that limited-English proficient voters receive assistance in Lakota with registration and absentee voting, and that bilingual poll officials are hired and trained. 

Further, the agreement ensures that on Election Day each polling place has an operational voting system accessible to persons with disabilities and persons with limited English proficiency, provisional ballots and written verification information, and the required signage. 

The division enforces the civil rights of American Indian students to receive education free of discrimination on the basis of race, national origin, color, religion or English language proficiency.

In March of 2011, the division obtained a resolution agreement with the Arizona Department of Education in which Arizona agreed to rescind its policy of mandating the use of a one-question Home Language Survey.  Instead, Arizona issued a directive that requires all school districts to use a three-question Home Language Survey, which will ensure that all potential English language learner (ELL) students are identified and assessed

 In the wake of the nationwide housing and foreclosure crisis, the Civil Rights Division has made enforcement of fair housing and fair lending laws a top priority.

 The division has created a dedicated fair lending unit in the Housing and Civil Enforcement Section and hired a Special Counsel for Fair Lending.  The division investigates allegations of discrimination in housing sales and rentals, as well as lending and other aspects of credit by entities such as car dealerships, commercial lenders, home lenders, and credit card companies. 

The Civil Rights Division also has authority to challenge places of public accommodation, such as hotels, restaurants and movie theaters, which discriminate based on race, color, religion or national origin.

The Civil Rights Division will continue that all Americans are protected and able to live a life free from discrimination.

 For more information, please visit justice.gov/crt