For six months Hand in Hand served as fiscal agent for the project while VIP incorporated as the Victim Intervention Project Institute (VIPI) and attained non-profit status. With the initial funds nearly gone, VIPI was awarded a continuation grant from the MN Center for Crime Victim Services. On January 1, 1997, VIPI officially became an independent entity. The St. Paul Police Department and the City of St. Paul lobbied the state legislature for additional funds needed to maintain the project. Other individuals and businesses support the project.

The St. Paul Police Department provides office space in the Homicide Unit as well as telephone lines and service. AT&T Wireless Services provides a cell phone, service and airtime for the director. Holy Spirit, St. Matthews, Gustavus Adolphus, and Gloria Dei Churches have donated space for support groups and training. The Sheraton Inn Midway, Concordia College, Cretin Derham High School and St. Matthews Lutheran Church have provided space for Memorial Services. Other contributors are listed elsewhere in the publication.

VIPI continues to serve its clients with crisis response and follow-up care, with support groups for homicide and suicide survivors, with Annual Memorial Services and through a variety of presentations in the community. VIPI strives to educate the public and heighten their awareness to the victim’s plight. As we look to the future, we hope to broaden the scope and breadth of services offered by VIPI.

Margaret mcAbee, director

The VIPI program director is a survivor herself. After the murder of her husband in 1985, McAbee joined a grief group for support. She became a trained facilitator and, for eight years, facilitated grief support groups while earning her B.A. in Psychology. McAbee went on to found the group, Adult Survivors of Homicide. The Saint Paul Police recognized the need for support for survivors and a task force was formed of which McAbee was a member. In 1995, VIPI became a reality, with McAbee as the director.

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history

The Victim Intervention Project (VIP) was developed at the request of Lt. Joe Corcoran, retired Commander of the St. Paul Police Homicide Unit. Corcoran recognized that families of homicide victims didn’t get help until their case was charged and that some cases are never charged and those families never get the help. Corcoran challenged the St. Paul Police Chaplains to develop a program that would respond to the needs of these people.

Three police chaplains, Maggie Rein, Dick Barrett and Bill Holden, picked up the challenge along with three people from Family Service, Inc., Linda Norquist and two volunteers, Gayle Roy and Margaret McAbee. McAbee and Roy were conducting the first of its kind weekly support group for Homicide survivors. Representing the St. Paul Police Department, the St. Paul Police Chaplains, the St. Paul Area Council of Churches and Parents of Murdered Children and Family Service, Inc this group began regular meetings to hammer out the plan that would become the Victim Intervention Project. Over the next two years other agencies, the Ramsey County Sheriff, the St. Paul Interdenominational Black Ministerial Alliance, the Ramsey County Attorney Office Victim Witness Division, and the Suburban Police Chaplains Corp joined the effort.

Family Service stepped forward, accepting responsibility for the project and raising the funds to begin the project. With funding from the United Way, the Bush and Emma Howe Foundations the project was officially launched in May 1995 with the hiring of Margaret McAbee. When the project was evaluated after the first 13 months 428 clients had been served. VIPI was given high marks by the clients, the homicide investigators, the victim witness advocates, the medical examiner, and the police chaplains. After two years at Family Service VIP was ready to try its wings.