KETTERING — A Kettering lawmaker is pushing a crime victims bill of rights through the Ohio House of Representatives. Now, Andrea White is hoping it can gain fast approval from the Ohio Senate to protect victims of crime.
News Center 7′s Mike Campbell talked to White about how Marsy’s Law is designed to stop piling additional trauma on the backs of crime victims.
Victims of crime often know when the person that assaulted them is arrested. However, after that is when things get hazy. This new bill is designed to keep them informed of every step of the process.
Marshell Gillis is a crime victim that was left paralyzed after a man she was giving a ride to got into a fight with his girlfriend in her backseat and opened fire. She was hit nine times and left abandoned in a motel parking lot.
“I really want to know why. But I am not going to get any clarification of why this happened to me,” Gillis said.
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Gillis’s story is repeated hundreds of times a year, just in Montgomery County, people becoming crime victims unexpectedly. And many feel they don’t have any control as the criminal justice system moves forward.
“Marsy’s Law is really about justice for all,” White said.
White is leading the effort to pass Marsy’s Law in Ohio. It’s named after an 11-year-old murder victim in California, it’s designed to protect and assert, crime victims’ rights.
“They also have guaranteed rights at the same level and to be a vigorously protected, as those accused of committing crimes against them,” White said.
White said 83 percent of Ohioans passed a constitutional amendment in 2017 for making crime victims’ rights as important as defendants rights every step of the legal process.
Her bill just passed the House 84-1 and heads to the Senate. But not everyone likes it. The American Civil Liberties Union believes it promotes a false equivalency of Co-Equal Rights.
They said it undermines the presumption of innocence for accused defendants. The ACLU also believes its unnecessary because most states have crime victims’ laws that it could cause constitutional problems down the road.
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White said she took input from public defenders and criminal defense lawyers. “We are vigorously defending their constitutional rights but not at the expense of victims’ rights,” she said.
Gillis was relieved her goths were upheld and her attacker eventually sentenced to prison.
“I couldn’t live still knowing he is out here living without justice,” Gillis said.
The goal is to let crime victims feel in control all through the criminal justice process.
Marsy’s Law still needs Senate approval and the governor’s signature before becoming law in Ohio.