Criminal Justice Program

 Beacon of Hope Crisis Center works collaboratively with our law enforcement partners to best serve victims of crime. 

Our victim advocates work with law enforcement to follow up on domestic violence and sexual assault cases and when needed will arrive in partnership ready to assist victims. We also educate victims about their rights, help them connect with law enforcement for reporting, and provide support navigating the criminal justice system.  Our criminal justice advocacy program is breaking the cycle of violence and educating victims about all of the resources available to assist them with leaving the situation and achieving freedom from the grip of domestic violence and sexual assault. Beacon of Hope Crisis Center is making every effort to intervene early and get victims safe before domestic violence escalates, we are helping to reduce violence and the chance of felony assaults and domestic homicides.

We provide domestic violence & sexual assault advocacy assistance to victims of crime.

History of How Our Law Enforcement Partnerships Began:

Speedway Project Partnership

In 2013 the initial project began as we became involved with DVN and the Coordinated Community Response, first partnering with Speedway PD to assist officers on Baker One runs. Our victim advocates worked and still do work with local law enforcement on Baker One domestic violence calls.  Baker One is a model program that addresses domestic violence homicide and serious assault by objectively identifying high risk domestic violence victims and perpetrators with repeated police runs and offering early intervention to both the victim and the abuser. 

In Indianapolis, police jurisdictions receive special officer training regarding Baker One, domestic violence, strangulation and other training topics as they arise.  Each police jurisdiction uses the IMPD Baker One manual that has been approved by IMPD professional standards. Per this manual, each jurisdiction can identify up to 25 Baker One candidates. In addition, IMPD maintains a database to capture all Baker One data, thus streamlining data collection and allowing the jurisdictions to be better able to collaborate on cases as domestic violence couples are often transient.

In addition to IMPD, Baker One has been embedded into the prosecutor’s office, community corrections, parole, probation, and other criminal justice response systems by changing protocol for response to domestic violence. 

Once identified as a Baker One case, a uniformed officer will approach the suspect, offering a resource card and encouraging the suspect to seek services for change. 

Victim safety and outreach is also an integral component of Baker One.  Special intervention and attention will be given to the victims identified as Baker One.  The Victim Advocate will respond to Baker One police reports either in person, by phone, or letter to offer the victim services, safety panning, and address other needs that they may have. 

Since its implementation, Indianapolis police districts have seen great success in the Baker One collaborative program. 

In May 2013, the Domestic Violence Network, Speedway Police Department, and the Julian Center approached Beacon of Hope to discuss a collaborative project that would implement Baker One in Speedway. Currently, the Julian Center administers the Baker One project for IMPD; however, they are at capacity for serving other policing jurisdictions. 

Under this project, Beacon of Hope collaborates with the Speedway Police Department to provide advocacy services to Baker One-identified victims and the Domestic Violence Network will provide Baker One technical assistance, resources, and training to the officers and victim advocates.  IMPD has agreed to share their Baker One database information with the Speedway Police Department officers and Beacon of Hope’s victim advocates.

The Speedway Baker One Project launched in 2013.

Lawrence Project Partnership
Beech Grove Project Partnership

In 2014 two additional law enforcement partnerships launched as a result of the law enforcement teams of Lawrence Township and Beech Grove hearing of Beacon of Hope's positive life saving success'.  They approached Beacon of Hope to partner with them for Domestic Violence related calls; working together in partnership to end the cycle of violence. 

Southport Project Partnership
Greenwood Project Partnership
Bargersville Project Partnership

In 2016 our partnership began with Southport Police Department. 

In the 1st quarter of 2017 our partnership began with Greenwood Police Department.  In the 4th quarter of 2017 our partnership began with Bargersville Police Department.
Read about our Coordinated Community Response initial partnership with
Speedway Police Department to assist officers on Baker One
domestic violence runs. 
D|V|N 2013 press release PDF below:
_speedway-boh_news_release.pdf
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