Description
The National Center for Victims of Crime (NCVC) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to providing information, resources, and advocacy for victims of all types of crime, as well as the people who serve them. The National Center for Victims of Crime hosts the annual National Training Institute, designed to share current research and effective policies with service providers, in order to advance the quality of services available to victims of crime.
History
Martha "Sunny" von Bulow's husband was arrested and charged with attempting to murder her by insulin overdose that ended up resulting in an irreversible coma. Her husband was convicted, but the conviction was overturned on appeal. At a second trial, he was found not guilty.
At a national meeting of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Alexander Auersperg, her son, met E. Gene Patterson, a co-chairman of a national victims' coalition. The two of them teamed up with Auersperg's sister Annie-Laurie and Morris Gurley, Sunny von Bulow's financial adviser, to form a new nonprofit organization with Patterson as director. The organization was named the Sunny von Bulow Victim Advocacy Center, and it opened in January 1986, in Fort Worth, Texas. Fort Worth was chosen because of its location in the center of the United States. Auersperg envisioned the organization to be a national information and referral organization for victim-advocate groups. Auersperg pledged $1.5 million to fund the organization during its first three years, with his hope that the organization would become self-supporting.
The organization was renamed the National Victim Center in 1987, and it became the National Center for Victims of Crime in December 1998.
