[GRAPHIC: LAW OFFICE OF ROBERT D. KIZER, Sexual Abuse Victims Advocate & Attorney, 512-551-1018 | 888-724-8710, www.robertkizerlaw.com]
ROBERT D. KIZER: Abuse is assault [phonetic]. When you see somebody abusing someone, that is not usually the first one in that chain. There is a chain back behind that of the abuser who creates the abuser.
So a lot of times, you get to where the one who actually has done the abuse to the child or to that adult in years has gone to jail. There's nothing there. There's no recovery for that child. And so if you could go back behind that, I'm going after the monster who created the monster. Most people believe that once there's a criminal prosecution that that's all that needs to happen. It's everything that's been done is done.
But we are forgetting the victim. The victim is the one who has a whole life ahead or has lost a lot of their life because of the abuse itself. So if we can go after the monster, the monster who created the monster, and maybe even another level or so on, then we get a recovery for the victim. We get something that helps the victim.
Well, as soon as they get to the authorities and they've got something started on that if it's a child now, then they come and see me because we can deal with kind of helping the prosecutor go along. We'll decide whether it's worth bringing the case before they even get the prosecution going so we can get more discovery.
Or of course, if it's someone who's older, someone who's past a child's age and now they're dealing with this or statute of limitations, there's a very good possibility that the prosecutor--you know, it's a long time what past they can prosecute. And so as a result, they might as well come to me right then. Let's see whether there is something we can do for them. And then if I believe that there's a way that we can get a prosecutor involved, talk with me.
I mean, I don't charge for a first conference. And not--from then, I may be a contingent fee so that my fees are paid for if I ever get a recovery for them. But that parent has--or the victim themselves has to just come and talk with me. Sit and let's see if there's some way that we can overcome if there's a statute of limitations problem or if we can overcome an evidentiary problem. Whatever it is that we can do that, we can get that victim to the right people who can determine and be able to prove up the case for them.
If we get a solution, we get a recovery, and get them started on the way to a recovery for themselves, a personal recovery, at that point, you know, hopefully I never lose some kind of contact with their lives, you know, because you want to find--you want to see in life when you're doing something like this that these--that you actually had an effect to change someone's life, to turn it around, to make them a viable part of society and make society work for them. And so I hope that I always have an involvement in my client's life afterwards.
[GRAPHIC: LAW OFFICE OF ROBERT D. KIZER, Sexual Abuse Victims Advocate & Attorney, 512-551-1018 | 888-724-8710, www.robertkizerlaw.com]
