Many Crime Victims Oppose Ballot Measures

The following statement was read at the September news conference announcing the formation of the campaign committee to oppose Measures 69-75:

My name is Arwen Bird, co-founder of SAFES ö Survivors Advocating For an Effective System. We're holding this press conference to announce the formation of Crime Victims For Justice, a PAC committed to educating Oregonians about the threat to our Bill of Rights from Measures 69-75.

These measures are being portrayed as a "crime victimsâ rights package." We chose our name to illustrate that many crime victims oppose these misguided and misleading measures. We believe Measures 69-75 would be better known as the Kenneth Starr Act, because what these measures really do is take power from judges and crime victims and give it to government prosecutors.

You'd have to be a lawyer or a politician to understand the legalese in these measures, but you don't have to be a lawyer to understand the damage they would do to our Bill of Rights. These measures would:

ð     Give government prosecutors the same powers abused by Kenneth Starr [73]
ð     Allow people to be jailed without bail, even before the facts are established [71]
ð     Let the government decide who is and is not a crime victim, to ignore certain crime victims who don't happen to fit  the prosecutor's goals, and even to name themselves as the victims in the case of victimless crimes.[69]
ð     They would force rape and incest victims to testify before a jury even if the victims object [70]
ð     Greatly increase the chance that innocent people will be convicted [72]
ð     And require government background checks of every Oregonian called for jury duty [75]

We all remember certain phrases from our high school civics classes, such as "Innocent Until Proven Guilty," "Beyond A Reasonable Doubt," and "Freedom From Self Incrimination." These are not empty phrases. They are principles embodied in the Oregon Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights was written to protect individual liberties and the rights of Oregonians from unreasonable government intrusion. Every one of those phrases above would be reduced or eliminated if these measures pass, giving the government powers our founding fathers did not trust the government to have.

They call this a victims' rights package. Well, we're crime victims. We are Crime Victims For Justice. And we want Oregonians to understand that the politicians and government prosecutors who crafted this outrageous power grab have wrapped themselves in the cloak of victims' rights, while leaving real crime victims like us naked.

Please Vote No on Measures 69-75.

Thank You.