Child Advocacy Center Opens in Claremont
CAC Claremont staff: (L-R) Teri LaRock, social worker for the CAPP team; Tonya Suarez, forensic interviewer; Cathy Brittis, CAC Director.
This new suite of offices is where children who are victims of abuse meet with a team of professionals from the fields of medicine, mental health, law enforcement, victim advocacy and others, to tell very difficult stories of what happened to them.
In an interview with the Valley News, Dr. Kent Hymel, CAPP's medical director, said "The vast majority of information that comes to light when investigating a crime like this comes to light because the child felt comfortable enough, in a safe place, to say what happens. You need a setting where the child only has to say it once."
The previous CAC office in Newport was in a convenient location, but didn't offer the privacy or comfort of the new Claremont location on Opera House Square. In 2005, CAC served a total of 41 children from Grafton County and five from Sullivan County. Before the Newport office opened in August 2006, all services were provided at CHaD, so the children who were to be interviewed needed to travel to Lebanon.
In 2008, the program served 114 children from Sullivan County. With the Claremont office up and running, the CAC expects to serve more than 150 children and families from Sullivan County alone this year, according to Cathy Brittis, the social worker who directs the program.
