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Revival of Victims Assitance Program lauded
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Posted on Feb 01 2000
The Department of Public Safety yesterday lauded a recent decision by the Marianas Visitors Authority to revive the Victims Assistance Program in a move to reduce, if not eliminate, crimes committed against tourists.
DPS Commissioner Charles W. Ingram lamented that efforts by policemen to arrest suspects in various crimes are not successfully brought to court mainly because the victims are no longer on island to testify against them.
“We cannot put them away since nobody would come back and testify because it is cost prohibitive for them to come back,” he said. Such situation, Mr. Ingram said, allows perpetrators to continue committing the crime because they can confidently get away with the offenses anyway.
Mr. Ingram noted a similar problem faced by law enforcers in Honolulu where suspected criminals are set free because the victims and witnesses could not come back to pursue the case against them.
MVA has set aside funding under the program which will pave the way for off-island visitors who were victims of crimes to return to the island and testify in criminal proceedings against the perpetrators.
The AGO’s Criminal Division has pledged its commitment to prosecute crimes against tourists and that no criminal will escape prosecution just because the victim happens to live outside the Commonwealth.
MVA Board Chair Dave M. Sablan underscored the need to maintain such program to assure visitors that the CNMI is a safe destination. “We don’t want these perpetrators to think that they can get away with committing criminal acts against our visitors,” he said.
This program, Mr. Sablan said, proves that the CNMI government is continuously looking at ways on how to safeguard visitors by making sure that they get the full protection of the law.
The government’s chief criminal prosecutor, Kevin Lynch, said his office will do everything to make the sure that criminals will be brought to court even if their victims live outside the Commonwealth.
