Facilitating Justice Information Sharing

The Edward Byrne Memorial Discretionary Grants Program, administered by the Office of Justice Programs' (OJP's) Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), furthers the Department's mission by assisting state and local jurisdictions in improving the criminal justice system and assisting communities in preventing drug abuse and crime. In fiscal year 2007, the Edward Byrne Memorial Discretionary Grants Program will focus on funding local, regional, and national efforts within six major categories: 1) targeting violent crime; 2) preventing crime and drug abuse; 3) enhancing local law enforcement; 4) enhancing local courts; 5) enhancing local corrections and offender reentry; and 6) facilitating justice information sharing. All categories combat, address, or otherwise respond to precipitous or extraordinary increases in crime, or in a type or types of crime.

The Stop the Silence: Stop Child Sexual Abuse, Inc. (CSA) will use the 2007 Byrne Discretionary grant award in the amount of $424,676 to develop a training course for court personnel on issues relating to childhood sexual abuse and trauma. The CSA will use its National Children's Bench Book to develop a national-level training program which will be beta-tested on approximately 150 court personnel at a conference in the Washington-metro area. The deliverable for this project will be the training curriculum and the beta-test training conference.

CA/NCF