Nonprofit Unveils New Tool To Help Fight Child Abuse

<p>Prosecutors and police have a new weapon in the fight against child abuse.&nbsp;It&rsquo;s a camper turned mobile-advocacy center, and it goes by the name &ldquo;Joey.&quot;</p>

Wednesday, September 28th 2016, 5:18 pm



Prosecutors and police have a new weapon in the fight against child abuse. 

It’s a camper turned mobile-advocacy center, and it goes by the name “Joey."

Joey gets it’s name from the kangaroo on the outside, but it’s what’s inside that matters.

The camper is a child-friendly environment where children who have been abused can tell trained interviewers what happened.  

"It’s up to the interviewer to guide that child, to tell us a story from beginning to end creating that picture as if we were there," said Maria Rosales-Lambert, director of the nonprofit Oklahoma Interviewing Services.

In metro areas, there are places where kids can go to be interviewed, but in rural areas most child victims are taken to police stations where often they’re interviewed by investigators who have little training and experience working with children. 

"Interviewing children is really a science,” Rosales-Lambert said. “We utilize techniques that have been researched a specific way because it's not just talking to kids. It's not just a regular conversation."

With Joey, trained interviewers can go anywhere in the state and talk with children. 

Interviews are taped, with the child’s knowledge, and often used to gather evidence against or to clear a suspect.

"We don't want kids to feel like they need to tell us something that didn't happen.  We want then to tell us if something happened or something didn't happen,” Rosales-Lambert said. “Because it's just as important."

Oklahoma Interviewing Services is funded through grants and donations. 

They say Joey is a great way to make children feel comfortable about talking about what happened, and, for just a little while, focus on being a kid again.  

"Them just saying you know, I’m not ready to go. I still want to play," Rosales-Lambert said. “That means that that's what they're focused on."

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