Did you know today is Denim Day?
Raise awareness about rape and sexual violence
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—Blue jeans will be the style of the day today as Southland residents take part in Denim Day in L.A. and the rest of the USA, a campaign to raise awareness about rape and sexual violence.
The group Peace Over Violence started Denim Day in Los Angeles and across the United States in 1999 when an Italian court overturned a rape conviction partially because the victim was wearing tight jeans—something the justices reasoned the suspect couldn't have removed without the victim's help.
Peace Over Violence estimates that more than 2 million people are expected to take part in local events, which will include presentations by organizers at city halls in Los Angeles and West Hollywood. The group is partnering in this year's events with 1in6.org, a group supporting adult male survivors of sexual abuse.
Student assemblies and events will also be held at a variety of school campuses, including San Gabriel, Manual Arts and Fairfax high schools and the Miguel Contreras Learning Complex and Young Oak Kim Academy.
Patti Giggans, executive director of Peace Over Violence, and Steve LePore, head of 1in6, will testify before the Los Angeles City Council on the issue of sexual violence and violence prevention.
Leona Smith, POV's director of counseling services, will speak to the West Hollywood City Council.
Also in West Hollywood, city employees will wear denim to work and gather outside City Hall at 10 a.m. for an annual group photograph.
In conjunction with the event, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Los Angeles police Chief Charlie Beck will hold a news conference to provide an update on the LAPD's effort to work through a testing backlog of DNA rape kits.
To learn more about Denim Day and Peace Over Violence follow these links.
WASHINGTON, D.C.—On April 27, 2011 over 3,500 students at eight (8) Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)—Clark Atlanta University, Coppin State University, Howard University, Lemoyne-Owen College, Morehouse College, Morgan State University, Norfolk State University and Prairie View A&M University—will participate in the 3rd Denim Day at HBCUs. The HBCU movement for Denim Day is organized by Ending Violence Against Women (EVAW): The HBCU Project, an initiative funded through the U.S.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—The Los Angeles Police Department's backlog of untested DNA rape kits, numbering more than 6,000 two years ago, has been eliminated, city officials said today.
"It was 2.5 years ago in this very room that we vowed to investigate every piece of evidence, follow every lead, exhaust every possible avenue that can lead to a prosecution of each open rape case,'' Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said. "Today we can announce ... the historical backlog of sexual assault evidence kits has been eliminated.''
LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is expected to highlight his eight years in office — particularly in the areas of public safety, education, business, transportation and the environment — when he delivers his final “state of the city” address this afternoon.
The relationship between the Los Angeles City Council’s three African American members—Bernard C. Parks and Jan Perry on the one side and Herb J. Wesson on the other—shows signs of combusting into an inferno that could deplete much of what political capital the city’s African American community has left.
The latest debacle is over the way Parks and Perry’s districts have been redrawn, but other sectors of the city also have a beef with the Los Angeles Redistricting Commission.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 last week to approve a redistricting plan that leaves boundaries largely unchanged and does not create a second Latino-majority district.
