Media Archive by Format: online

For anyone who has worked on issues of violence against women, this should serve as a wake-up call that the work is far from done. For anyone who works on social change, it serves as a reminder that monitoring implementation of hard-won laws is critical. read more

Every year, thousands of individuals take the courageous step of reporting their rape to the police. read more

Last year, a FedEx delivery truck arrived at the Detroit Police Department storage facility to pick up the first batch of untested rape kits bound, finally, for crime labs. Thus began Detroit’s massive task of processing its rape kit backlog – the more than 11,000 kits that were left behind to languish in a police warehouse, some for more than two decades. read more

With Wednesday’s announcement that the State of Michigan may provide $4 million in funding to help test old rape kit evidence in Detroit, Gov. Rick Snyder and Attorney General Bill Schuette made it clear that preventing and prosecuting sexual assaults in Detroit is a priority. read more

The Joyful Heart Foundation Gala 2013 was held on 42nd Street in New York City on Thursday evening, May 9th. The event was sponsored by a number of well-known companies including Pepsi Cola Company, Michael Stars, Verizon Communications, The Art of Grace, and Wolf Films among many others. The founder, Mariska Hargitay, was joined at the event by her husband, Peter Hermann, and a number of celebrities including Danny Pino, Mary J. Blige, Jemima Kirke, Will Chase, Julianne Hough, Christopher Meloni, Uma Thurman, Mary Louise Parker, Glenn Close, and Harry Connick Jr. just to name a few. read more

Actress Mariska Hargitay talks about helping victims of sexual and domestic abuse on a video released Friday by the Rockland County District Attorney’s Office promoting the county’s “Spirit of Rockland" Special Victims Unit. read more

Alexandra von Furstenberg, Mariska Hargitay and other fashionable folk turned out for Lanvin's collection preview and luncheon to benefit the Joyful Heart Foundation and toast Hargitay's (who is JHF's Founder & President) birthday. read more

Hargitay is an unusual Hollywood story. The daughter of a screen legend (her mother was famous sex symbol Jayne Mansfield, and Mariska, then a toddler, was in the car Mansfield was driving when she died in a horrific accident), Hargitay achieved stardom the old-fashioned way, by working through the ranks. read more

While we are absolutely, truly delighted that President Obama signed the Violence Against Women Act last week, it's also clear that the legislation never should have been allowed to lapse in the first place. The fact that it was even used as a political chess piece is a disturbing indication of the low priority that sexual and domestic violence have in this country as a national issue. read more

Yesterday I attended an event held by Vice President Biden and Attorney General Holder focused on reducing domestic violence homicides. read more

A week after President Obama signed a bill reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, celebrities and business leaders came to the Capitol today to end domestic abuse. read more

Vice President Biden, in Rockville Wednesday to announce a new initiative to curb domestic violence, got personal as he described the effort to eliminate what he called “a blight on the nation’s conscience.” read more