Law expands burial payments for violent crime victims

By Lara Moscrip, Bay City News Service

December14, 2006

Family members of violent crime victims can now have the funeral and burial expenses of their relatives reimbursed by the state, without regard to the victim's parole or probation status, Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, announced Wednesday.

A bill Leno introduced reimburses the family of violent crime victims for expenses of up to $7,500.

Before the signing of the bill, if the victim of a violent crime was on parole or probation at the time of death, burial and funeral expenses were not reimbursed by the California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, Leno said.

Community leaders and members of Community Leadership Academy Emergency Responses (CLAER), based in San Francisco, cheered the bill's passage.

"When society fails to protect individuals who have worked hard to get their lives back on track and leave their gang pasts behind after release from prison, the least we can do is make sure their families' losses are not further compounded with funeral and burial expenses,'' Leno said in a statement.

According to Leno, over the past five years, nearly 42 percent of Oakland homicide victims were on parole or probation when they died.

"These families have suffered severely -- first through the anguish of witnessing their loved one get swallowed into a life of crime and again when their loved one is unjustly killed after attempting to do what society has asked of them,'' Leno said.

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