Black Iowa crime victims more likely to be denied state compensation

DES MOINES — In Iowa’s victims compensation program, a fund intended to help the victims in the aftermath of crime, a gap exists in who gets money and who doesn’t, a disparity that some advocates say shows racial bias.

An analysis shows that Black Iowans were more likely to be denied claims to the victims compensation program, according to data from claims made between 2019 and 2021 obtained by the Associated Press.

The disparity in Iowa’s victims compensation program is significant, but smaller than some other states the Associated Press analyzed.

For 2019 through 2021, Black Iowans made up 13.4 percent of applications and 19.4 percent of denials — meaning their share of denials made up about 6 percentage points more than their share of applications. White applicants made up 64.3 percent of the applications and 59 percent of denials — also about 6 percentage points.

For the same time frame, Black applicants were denied nearly 20.2 percent of the time, while white applicants were denied 12.8 percent of the time. Hispanic applicants were denied 11.3 percent of the time. Overall, Iowa’s victims compensation program denied 14 percent of all applications for victims compensation.

Victims compensation is a process in every state that reimburses crimes victims for expenses like medical bills, funeral expenses, lost wages and other expenses.

In 2022, Iowa’s program — a division of the Attorney General's Office — paid out $3.2 million to victims of crimes, according to a state report. The years the AP analyzed — 2019 to 2021 — the Iowa Attorney General’s Office was under the direction of former Democratic Attorney General Tom Miller.

There is a range of reasons someone could be denied compensation, including missing deadlines or contributing to the crime.

There are some caveats to the data collected: the number of total applications was gathered from federal reports, while the number of denials was provided by the state. The state offered different totals for each year than the federal government’s, likely because it counted claims differently than the federal government.

Disparities

Of the 23 states measured by the AP, Iowa’s disparity between Black applicants and denials was the eighth largest. States like California, Georgia and Delaware have higher disparities, while Maryland, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania had lower disparities.

The gap is more pronounced when it comes to the reason for the denials: White applicants were more likely to be denied for administrative issues like missing deadlines, while Black Iowans were more likely to be denied because of so-called behavioral reasons, like provoking the crime or aiding in another crime.

Black Iowans accounted for 31.5 percent of those behavioral denials while making up 17 percent of all denials. White applicants account for 46.2 percent of behavioral denials while making up 62.2 percent of all denials.

The ‘perfect victim’

The victims services division can be difficult to navigate and the approval system can be biased against Black Iowans, said Luana Nelson-Brown, executive director of the Iowa Coalition for Collective Change in West Des Moines.

The group works in homicide victim advocacy and helps families of homicide victims obtain victims compensation. It received funding from the Attorney General’s Office until it lost its tax-exempt status in 2021 because of failure to file tax forms.

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Unconscious bias can enter the victims compensation process in a litany of ways, Nelson-Brown said, largely stemming from a lack of cultural competence on the part of those reviewing applications and notions of who makes the “perfect victim.”

Applications for assistance can be denied if police or a specialist determines the person provoked or incited the crime or was assisting in a separate criminal act. Police also must determine that an actual crime occurred, so killings determined to be in self-defense or domestic disputes are often excluded.

When an all-white or mostly white team of police and victim specialists review the circumstances around a crime, biases tend to show up, Nelson-Brown said, because they lack the understanding of how crime works in Black communities.

“When you don’t have someone from the Black community as a compensation specialist, … then you don’t have specialists who really understand what’s going on in the community,” she said.

“If you don't know what's happening in the community, the climate of the community and what's going on with crimes, then it's really hard to determine whether or not you're getting an accurate picture of the crime.”

Nelson-Brown said a key to reducing disparities in the system would be diversifying the staff that reviews claims for victims compensation or creating a community review team made up of people representative of the state’s different communities.

“Historically, the AG’s office has not been very diversified, especially on the compensation side,” she said. “So it's only natural for compensation specialists’ bias to lean toward what they know about the community that they're making decisions about. I would suggest that they have a community peer review team.”

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Nelson-Brown said she had conversations with the Attorney General’s Office, under Tom Miller, about making changes to the process, but those changes never came to fruition.

After losing its nonprofit status and state funding, Nelson-Brown’s coalition is likely shutting down in the coming months, she said. But she said the work to address biases should continue.

“We’re not going to be around to do it, but somebody needs to do it,” she said. “Because it’s only natural for that bias to creep in. You can only operate from what you know.”

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Republican Attorney General Brenna Bird, who took office in January, made reviewing the state’s victim services operations one of her first priorities, ordering a “top-down and bottom-up audit” of the office’s victim services section. Bird’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment on whether examining racial disparities is part of that review.

“I want to sit down and talk directly with the people who were affected and providing the services to see how we can do better,” Bird said in a January interview on her plans for the audit.

One family found it difficult to get compensation

Even when a crime victim’s claim is approved, receiving compensation can present a host of challenges. That was the case for the family of Michael Williams, a Black man who was murdered in Grinnell in 2021.

Like other state compensation programs, the funds are given as a reimbursement — so families generally must make the initial payment for travel, medical appointments and other expenses out of pocket. Iowa law does allow the state to pay up to $500 immediately if officials determine “undue hardship” would otherwise result.

Although Williams’ family was approved for compensation, they faced hurdles in verifying expenses, and the fund did not cover everything, like food, while they were traveling.

Paula Terrell, Williams’ aunt, said she was the only one in the family with a credit card, so she shouldered travel costs and navigated the reimbursement process for lodging, rental cars, gas and other expenses as the family traveled for the trial of the man who killed Williams. She said there was high scrutiny that made it difficult to get reimbursed for expenses.

Terrell worked with a victim advocate from a Cedar Rapids-based firm who was able to secure free hotel rooms and meals for the family. The process, she said, “would have been impossible without an advocate.”

Still, the process left the family feeling like they had to fight to receive any compensation.

“Everybody doesn't have a credit card and the means,” she said. “Murders are not something that is planned for. I just wish they could be a little lenient. We were victims, but we felt we fought the whole time. We just weren't treated like victims.”

Williams’ ex-wife, Janalee Boldt, faced similar hurdles in securing compensation for herself and their three children. She said it took several months to learn about and apply for compensation, and it was hard to communicate with the Attorney General’s Office.

Once compensation was approved, some expenses were not covered, like moving. Boldt and her children moved out of Grinnell after the murder, saying she felt like they were “chased out of town.” The victims compensation fund ended up covering the cost of the move.

“They didn't give us that information right away about (victims compensation),” she said. “They need a plan on people's expenses as well. … They just need to plan ahead. It’s rough. It’s a lifetime of it.”

Comments: cmccullough@qctimes.com