FOREST, Va. – Children living in Bedford County who report sexual abuse will now have advocates closer to home.
In 2009, the Bedford County Sheriff's Office and Children’s Trust Roanoke Valley began to work together and saw 11 cases at that time.
Recommended Videos
This past year, the group has seen 53 children. A majority of them were sexually abused.
This is the reason for a new child advocacy center in Forest.
“The forensic interviewers with Children’s Trust are mutual interviewers. They don’t work for law enforcement; they don’t work for DSS. They’re trained specifically on how to talk to children based on development level,” said Christina Rouse, the Children's Advocacy Center program director and lead forensic interviewer with Children’s Trust.
Before today, the victim and family members had to travel to the Star City for interviews and to Lynchburg General Hospital for an examination.
According to Sheriff Mike Brown, the center is the first in the commonwealth to have a forensic office on-site where nurses will use a scope to examine the child.
“So that we can see injuries that may be a little difficult to see in the naked eye. And then we have the ability to capture it on camera so that we can store it digitally for the next step which is the court process,” said April Rasmussen, the coordinator of the forensic program at Centra Health said.
In a soundproof room with hidden cameras, investigators will question the child, while others watch from another room, hoping it will be easier for the child to tell their story just once.
“It’s easier for us in law enforcement the investigators, the prosecutors, the social workers to have something that’s regionally, centrally located, just for time, as well as all of us working together,” said Sgt. Stephen Anders, with Bedford County's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.