Honoring those harmed by crime

Speaking on the DeKalb County Courthouse steps Wednesday, Kelly Gibson said until she started thinking about what to say in her speech, she never really accepted the fact that she, too, was a victim of crime. On April 10, 2020, Gibson was traveling with her former husband and her oldest daughter Hannah when they here hit head-on by an impaired driver. Her former husband and Hannah died at the scene of the crash she said, while she escaped with minor injuries.

“But I was and still am a victim. Every day I deal with struggles, the memories, the flashbacks and what ifs,” she said. Gibson spoke at an event organized by District Attorney Summer Summerford and her staff to recognize National Crime Victims Remembrance Week.



Court and local officials, law enforcement officers, advocate groups, and most importantly, crimes victims and their families attended. Summerford said its important for the court system and the communities remember those who feels the impact of crime directly and indirectly, even after the courts have done what they can to deliver justice. “We all go on to the next case,” she said of those who work in law enforcement and the judicial system.

Families who’ve lost someone to a crime must go on with lives that have been irrevocably altered. In addition to Gibson and Summerford, DeKalb County Children’s Advocacy Center Executive Director Amber McPherson, Fort Payne Police Chief David Davis and Fort Payne Mayor Brian Baine spoke at the ceremony; Sheriff Nick Welden planned to attend but could not. Summerford recognized community service providers who are “on the front lines of helping victims and their fmailies find healing and navigate the often confusing creiminal justice system.

” Those providers attending were Domestic Violence Crisis Services at Kelly’s Rainbow, Family Services of North Alabama, the DeKalb County Children’s Advocacy Center, Comprehensive Conseling, and the nearest courthouse facility dog, Kuzco, and the dog’s handler, Patricia Falcon, Executive Director of the James M. Barrie Children’s Advocacy Center in Etowah County. To see the program, go to the Southern Torch Facebook page .

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