Seeking Justice and Solutions: A Prosecutor’s Guide to Opioid Overdose Investigations

Authors: PCE and Aequitas

Authors: PCE, DANY, Bronx DA’s Office, and Aequitas

Modern prosecutors no longer simply react to arrests, but instead they engage with their communities, learn about crime trends, and ask broader questions about how to fairly and effectively improve public safety.

The Delaware Attorney General’s Office has a dedicated Community Engagement Unit that strives to create a safer community through consistent collaboration with the community and many outreach programs from resource fairs to reentry support. A member of the unit was formerly incarcerated and has provided invaluable assistance with community engagement.

Author: NDAA

To better address domestic violence, this guide provides strategies to prosecutors that increase victim safety and offender accountability and includes information on multi-agency collaborations and co-located service models such as family justice centers.

Office of the Licking County Prosecuting Attorney (Newark, OH)

Population: 175,409 | Contact Information 

The LCPA is creating a Domestic Violence Unit (DVU) that will focus on vertical prosecution to hold offenders accountable and ensure community safety.

St. Paul City Attorney’s Office (St. Paul, MN)

The St. Paul City Attorney’s Office (SPCAO) created the “Gone on Arrival (GOA) Project” to address threat issues in domestic violence cases when the offender is not at the crime scene when law enforcement arrives.

The King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office in Seattle, Washington has provided civil protection to victims of domestic violence for over thirty years through its Protection Order Advocacy Program. They now leverage a tool called Legal Atoms, a software platform in which protection order specialists can work alongside victims remotely to complete the steps necessary to file for a civil protection order. See PowerPoint. The office also created Project Safety, a partnership with civil Legal Aid to provide legal navigators to DV victims to assist them with needed civil services. 

Authors: PCE, NRTAC

This paper, developed by PCE’s Executive Director Kristine Hamann and St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office Chief of Trials Rachel Smith, addresses the critical question of how best to maximize the resources of a public forensic laboratory.

In order to help youth achieve better outcomes in life and prevent their involvement in the criminal justice system, prosecutor’s offices have engaged in commendable efforts to reduce truancy. Offices have created multi-disciplinary truancy-reduction programs at the high school and elementary school levels.

Author(s): Kristine Hamann and John Delaney

Fifteen seasoned violent-crime prosecutors shared their ideas about how to improve the investigation of violent crimes at a meeting sponsored by BJA and DOJ. This paper shares an overview of the meeting discussion and the approaches and challenges faced by the jurisdictions at the meeting.