Where crime victims can turn for help

For every crime, there is a victim - and volunteers are on call to offer sympathy and support.

IN affluent areas, help is a cellphone call away; and in poorer, rural areas, it's even closer - in a room in the police station, manned by volunteers on a roster system.

Whichever way it is done, victim support programmes (VSP) can mean the difference between hope and despair for rape survivors and victims of other violent crimes.

The programmes were started by Business Against Crime (BAC) in 1997, and by now there are VSPs in 77 police stations in Gauteng. Community-based initiatives, they're strong in the cities. "Regions where we're not so active are the Vaal and the North Rand, and that's our priority for the new year," says Zuzelle Pretorius, national programme manager.

The project was devised in conjunction with a British victim support scheme, working with a range of government departments - justice, health, welfare, and the South African Police Service - and relevant non-governmental organisations.

Pilot projects were developed for two very different areas, Rosebank - where volunteers deal with 12 to 15 cases a month - and Alexandra, where the average is over 80. From the lessons learnt, BAC put together a victim support kit - step-by-step guides on how to start a VSP, the rights of victims, how to train volunteers and managers - everything one needs to know to get one going. There's also a directory of services, everything from Aids information to children's homes, legal aid bureaux, hospitals, NGOs that deal with trauma.

"Crime," reads the first manual in the kit, "violates the human rights of a victim … These rights include the right:

1. To be treated with respect and dignity
2. To offer information
3. To receive information
4. To legal advice
5. To protection
6. In certain circumstances, victims also have the right
   To compensation."

It is up to the volunteers to make sure these things happen for victims of violent crimes. Here is the way they work:

In some police stations, volunteers are notified whenever a victim reports a violent crime. In others, the victim is told about the VSP but must approach the volunteers himself or herself.

Volunteers start with a minimum of two days of basic training. They can opt for further courses, ranging from short courses on court procedures to major counselling courses with Lifeline. Their job is to "provide basic emotional support and practical support. For example," says Pretorius, "they help the victim to contact family and friends and to get clean clothes, if relevant - and then refer traumatised victims to specialised service providers". Generally volunteers will see victims for up to three sessions before referring the person "either to organisations such as Lifeline that specialise in counselling - or, if the person prefers, to a private social worker or psychologist in the area".

That's only part of the service. The volunteer should also tell the client what will happen next, "and act as an interface between the victim and the criminal justice system - so if the victim has problems getting information on the case, they can phone us." They work with NGOs that specialise in court support and court preparation, and Pretorius says they intend to build court support into the programme - and, eventually, support for tourists who have been victims of crime.

They are also planning to extend the programme well beyond Gauteng. It's already started up in Mpumalanga, and although there are some VSPs in the Western Cape, they are not part of the national BAC programme - so Pretorius has her eye on the Western and Eastern Cape, as well as KwaZulu-Natal.

If people in an area that has no VSP want to start one up - and not every police station in Gauteng has a VSP - the national office, headquartered in Morningside, is ready to help.

"This is very much a police station-based programme. But if there's an NGO already working in that community, for example, then we'll make contact through them. We'll encourage the NGO to link up with us for networking purposes."

If there are no NGOs working in victim support or empowerment, however, a VSP can still be organised. "We'll say 'Go and identify the relevant stakeholders in your community - someone from the local clinic, the local churches, schools, the South African Police Services, the community policing forum (CPF). Establish a mult-idisciplinary committee in your area which is related to the CPF but is not CPF-driven. We'll arrange a half-day workshop for a management committee, but it is critical that the VSP be community-driven."

Often volunteers are people who have either been victims of crime themselves or have seen friends of family affected by crime. Many others simply want to give something back to the community.

A co-ordinator must be elected by the management committee, and negotiate with police for a victim support room at the police station. There are several reasons for this: to minimise costs, to facilitate the laying of charges - and to make sure victims know there is help just down the corridor.

"The quality of the relationship between the victim support volunteers and the police affects referrals," she says - and it is in the interests of the SAPS to support VSPs as one more weapon against crime. For, as the manual points out: "Empowered victims help with the investigation by reporting the crime … their evidence helps decide whether … bail should be granted … They help with the prosecution … by acting as a witness for the state .. victims' evidence helps to convict offenders …[and] a victim who has contributed to a successful conviction of an offender feels that justice has been done - and does not need to commit an act of violence (revenge) to feel better."