@WildWayne talks with @NOPDNews for Domestic Violence Month

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Q ninety three, is your boywild Way ain't coming at you. You
just heard DJ rowing at five o'clockfix that special throwback Thursday edition, hey
man, But we got more onthe platter, man, Some serious things
going down in our community. Itis Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and I
thought it was very important to talkabout this today, and I got some

(00:22):
members of NPD here today because ofsome of the very horrific incidents that have
happened recently in the local area.And it's not just this month, this
is an entire year of things thathappen, not just locally and nationally when
it comes to domestic violence. Somy thing was, I really think sometimes

(00:45):
people don't understand all of the differentthings that our NPD members do. Right
here, so I have Miss RachelleThomas, she's the director of the New
Orllans Police Department Special Victims Division inSocial Services you and how are you today?
Wonderful, excellent, And also wehave Keith Taya here. I said
it right, all right, key, key, she is the lead social

(01:07):
worker of the New Orleans Police DepartmentSpecial Victims Division and Social Services Unit.
And also Miss Kyrie McGee, howare you? I'm great, happy,
to be here, Okay, thankyou. She's an advocate for the New
Orleans Police Department Special Victims Division andSocial Services Unit as well. So,
like I said, I think alot of people don't realize that it's not
just an arresting thing that you guysdo. There's a much bigger scope of

(01:33):
work that is entailed, and youguys are part of that, especially when
it comes to domestic violence and someof the things that are associated with that.
So what exactly is the scope ofthe work that you guys do.
Okay, So the scope of thework for the special Victims. This division
consists of four specialized units, childabuse, domestic violence, sex crimes,

(01:57):
and human trafficking. Okay, Today, however, our focus is going to
be on raising awareness for domestic violenceor intimate partner violence. And then raising
this awareness, we want the communityto know and to understand our role as
social workers embedded within this unit.We work side by side closely with the

(02:20):
detectives as liaison. We have detectives, we have investigators, and we have
social workers. Our detectives respond tofelony domestic violence charges that are reported,
and along with that, the socialworkers work and respond to calls on seam
with the survivor with the detectives tooffer survivor intervention and trauma inform intervention.

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Now I didn't know all of thatstuff, But you guys even do more
community work like this, correct,Yes, we do, And what are
some of those things that you do? So along with the company the detectives
on, we also work in thecommunity in schools, so we provide prevention

(03:06):
presentations from the collegiate level all theway to the elementary level. We also
educate the students about healthy versus unhealthytouching, sexting, bullying, unhealthy versus
healthy relationships. How do you dealwith that kind of thing? Like,
how do you address it? Iknow these are some things that are kind

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of preventative maintenance. Yes it's apreventative maintenance, but we address it by
educating the youth making sure that theydon't end up in that system. So
it's a double edged So because youhave your ones that they want to do
what they want to do, wehave the ones that, okay, well
they'll follow you. I've been backto schools year after year and whole Miss
Kiki. I remember you from lastyear, and I remember that you told

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me this and this helped a lot. So you have some special events that
you guys kind of do as well. Yeah. So in the community under
our division, since we have humantrafficking and the massive violence, sexual assault,
and child's abuse, we have awarenessevents for those particular months. Okay.
So Human Traffic Awareness Month is usuallyin January, so we'll have our

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annual Adopter Black where the community partnerscome together and adopt the black where the
high trafficking areas are. We alsoon a child Abuse and Sexual Assault Awareness
Month that is in April, andNational Crimes Victims Rights Week which is April,
and also Night Out against Crime isin October. Okay, and then
you have another event coming up ontomorrow. Tomorrow kicks off the weekend.

(04:35):
So Kyrie, can you tell usa little bit about what's going on with
the Purple and Bright No More SilidNight's event. Yes, So we're very
excited to host this event tomorrow toraise awareness about domestic violence, bring the
community together and equip them with someresources from service providers. So the event
again will take place tomorrow on Octobertwenty seventh, from five thirty to seven

(04:58):
thirty. It will be hell oh, that's seven fifteen South broad Street at
the New Orleans Police Department headquarters inthe courtyard. Now, what exactly will
be going on during this event?This event will have we invited judges from
the Criminal District Court to speak aboutthe criminal justice process and the hopes of
bridging the gap between law enforcement,the criminal justice system, survivors, and

(05:21):
partnering agencies. We'll also just behonoring and celebrating survivors, okay, and
that's important so that they can feelsome sense of appreciation after they get these
really dark spaces. And then youhave some professionals that I can probably answer
some questions and talk about policy aswell, which is super important. Yes,

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I also want to add that we'llhave resources available for anybody who might
need them, who might be sufferingfrom them. Now, after this incident
that happened with the young lady wholost their kids in the fire just the
other day, it became painfully obviousthat a lot of people don't know what
resources they have out there. Sothis I think is super important. And

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with this just happening, that onemade the news, but there's so many
of these things that don't make thenews. So do you have any advice
for people that are in these issuesof domestic violence or as you said earlier,
intimate partner violence, like what shouldthey do to protect themselves? What

(06:26):
I suggest when I work with survivorsfirst is to always call nine to one
one, of course, but alsoto have a domestic violence safety kit.
So this safety kit should include importantdocuments like birth certificates, social security cards,
a driver's license or ID, children'simportant documents, extra cash if possible,

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and close packed for a few days. This kit should be prepared in
advance just in case the time comeswhere you need to get out of the
danger. That's important to know.I think people that maybe are in those
situations just never think about those kindof pacts in case they do have to
flee. Like you know, Iwas listening to that nine one one call

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and it was just devastating to hear. And I can imagine if she was
there, she would have something likethat to be able to easily get out
or some of those other ones.Ah geez. It's just always heartbreaking to
hear these kind of things that happen. But I think that's important for people
to know that have been in thatsituation because a lot of them is not

(07:30):
the first time it's happened repeatedly intheir households, But that's good to know.
Do you have any other information likeshould be vital for maybe people that
are in these situations to have incase they need to make a phone call.
Is there a particular number or adepartment or is it just a regular
nine one one call, or evenif it's after the crisis has happened,

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they've lived through the crisis and they'relike, you know what, I can't
keep doing this. So after lookcrisis. Back to that safety kit.
Another thing that we do is wehelp survivors create a safety plan. Okay,
so after they've packed that safety kit, that safety plan goes into effect
because that includes the family, thechildren's close family, friends, and end

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that we help the survivor come upwith it's called a cold word. And
when they come up with this coldword, if they say that cold word
and that perpetrator is on the way, are the mother knows that it's about
to go down, then she'll saycookies and the kids know to go to
that safe place, or to goand make that phone call and or to

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That's part of the safety plane,along with some other things with that safety
plane. We ask them to giveus an undisclosed location that the perpetrator is
not aware of. Now, I'mnot going to go through everything because it's
this air and we don't want tospill the beings on everything for safety for
the survivors. But that safety planis very important. So they don't have

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to think think about what to do. It's already there. They just execute
the plan. No doubt that that'simportant. That's important. Is there a
crisis hotline number anything maybe that victimsor potential victims can can have on deck?
So a crisis hotline number for domesticviolence is a twenty four hour hotline

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for Louisiana it is one eight aeight four one one one three three three.
But also for the New Orleans PoliceDepartment. If it's an incident that
previously happened that went unreported and you'renow ready to report, you can also
make a report at one of ournine emergency numbers. It is five zero

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four eight two one two two twotwo. And also the Family Justice Center,
who caters to domestic violence and sexualassault, they also have a twenty
four hour hotline crisis number which iseight sixty six nine five five four with
area code five zero four. Allright, well, I thank you ladies

(10:01):
for coming out today to share thatimportant information. If you want to make
any donations for the lady whose childrenwere lost in the fire due to domestic
violence, you can drop those offover at the headquarters for NPD seven fifteen
South Broad Street, and that's gonnabe uhlific child WUS unit. We'll be

(10:26):
doing also collecting like any of thosethings tomorrow at the n OPD, I'm
sorry, the NRD, the NORDand Q ninety three Haunted House that's happening
right there at the end of NormancyFrancis Parkway, the old break Tag station.
We're gonna have a great hornted housefor families out there. And also
another haunted house type event going downwith boutad dot com which will be twenty

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nine hundred Automond Street on Saturday.So just if you're a community member you're
not able to make it over theheadquarters that spots and there is a go
fundme as well. This is gonnabe a long process for this lady to
get past what happened, if ever, and try to get hold again.
So these are things that they willdefinitely need once again. I want to

(11:09):
thank you ladies for coming out.We have Miss Rachelle Thomas, Miss Ketya
or key Key Hill and also MissKyrie McGee. Thank you so much and
shout out to NPD as well.Thank you for having us