International Human Rights Come Home to California: Legislators Briefed on Torture Survivors in State and Their Needs

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

Carlos Mauricio, Center for Justice & Accountability (CJA) client and torture survivor, with CJA Executive Director Pamela Merchant at CJA's May 2008 Annual Dinner in San Francisco

By Pamela Merchant
Executive Director
Center for Justice and Accountability

Last week, a unique group of California-based NGOs convened in Sacramento to educate California lawmakers on the importance of state-sponsored support and advocacy for California’s population of torture survivors. Representatives from the California Consortium of Torture Treatment Centers, which shares information and best practices regarding the treatment of torture survivors living in California, held a press conference to promote recognition of the long-term psychological and physical effects of torture and the role treatment centers in California play in the recovery process. The June 26th conference marked the 21st anniversary of the 1987 Geneva Convention Against Torture and the 11th United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.

Over 2.5 million refugees have resettled in the United States since 1975. Of this number, over 662,000 refugees have resettled in California, many of whom fled their home countries in response to violent human rights abuses. California, therefore, has a vast number of torture survivors, each of whom must overcome their past, while facing the inherent struggles of providing for their families and assimilating into their communities.

The California Consortium of Torture Treatment Centers is devoted to promoting treatment services for torture survivors and is composed of groups that aid in this recovery process. One such group, the Center for Justice & Accountability (CJA), has pioneered a survivor-centered approach to the quest for justice for gross human rights abuses that combines medical and psycho-social services with legal representation to both empower and heal torture survivors and their communities.

CJA was founded in 1998 in response to the reality that many perpetrators of international human rights abuses had also sought refuge in the U.S. CJA’s first client was a Bosnian torture and detention camp survivor who experienced additional trauma after he learned that his torturer was living freely in the same community in the U.S. The basis of CJA’s work is the recognition that the need for justice is an integral component of a torture victim's recovery process and that healing cannot take place when the perpetrator continues to live with impunity.