(Joseph Kolb/Fox News Latino)

Ciudad Juarez launches aggressive campaign for female crime victims

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CIUDAD JUAREZ –  In a small room at the Fiscalía Especializada en Atención a Mujeres Víctimas por Razones de Género, Bernardo Manzano stood pensively with his hands cuffed behind his back, while two police officers stood on either side of him as he was photographed and questioned by more than a dozen reporters. Not a drug dealer this time. The 43-year-old maquiladora worker was about to be charged with sexually assaulting his wife. Parading suspects accused of committing crimes against women in front of the media have become increasingly common here, in the wake of a combined and aggressive campaign by Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua state to curb these kind of offenses. A 20-year legacy of crimes against women, especially the well-publicized killing of women in the late 1990s – popularly known as ‘femicides’– has given this border city international notoriety.

One in every six girls in the United States and one in four boys is molested during childhood, according to the National Institution of Justice Report.

Fear of deportation stops women from reporting domestic violence

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EL PASO – The woman standing in front of the audience could barely speak, signs of abuse still resonated in her voice, as she began her words became loud and clear. “She was strangled so badly by an abusive spouse that it literally affected her ability to speak, but when she did it was obvious that she definitely had something to say,” said Shannon Osborne, coordinator of the Women’s Resource Center (WRC) at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), during an interview. Osborne witnessed the woman tell an audience of men and women about her experience with domestic violence between her and her partner at a convention on resources available to victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. Osborne works at the WRC on campus helping provide victims of domestic violence and sexual assault assistance through various resources available on and off campus. “I encourage someone who has survived domestic abuse or sexual assault to talk to someone, if its 0-72 hours after the incident occurred I recommend that they contact STARS, the local rape crisis center. If it’s after that mark of time I recommend that they talk to someone at the Center Against Family Violence,” Osborne said.