PAVE Leadership

EXECUTIVE STAFF:

Angela Rose

Founder & Executive Director

In response to her abduction and sexual assault Angela Rose turned a suburban community into a group of proactive citizens at the age of seventeen. After banning together with her perpetrator’s other victims and their families, Angela spearheaded the movement that culminated with the passage of the 1998 Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act in Illinois. This act enables the State to hold a sexually violent person in custody under psychiatric care if the person has been convicted of a previous sexually violent offense, exhibits a mental disorder and is seen as a threat. Nearly 200 convicted sex offenders have been committed as Sexually Violent Persons in Illinois since 1998.

As a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Angela began to intimately understand how silence cloaks the prevalence of sexual assault. Instead of retreating in the face of adversity, Angela rose to the challenge to voice what is often left unsaid. In 2000, the UW Associated Students of Madison appointed Angela Campus Safety Coordinator.

Empowered by her experiences on campus, Angela founded PAVE (Promoting Awareness, Victim Empowerment) in 2001 – a community-based organization that uses social, educational and legislative tactics to shatter the silence of sexual violence. That same year, Angela was appointed the UW Women’s Issues Diversity Liaison, where she successfully initiated a dialogue on sexual assault within diverse cultural communities. In 2001, Angela was elected the President of the WI Chapter of the National Organization for Women.

Through PAVE, Angela has trained thousands in sexual assault prevention, produced a documentary entitled “Transition to Survivor” and founded Men Opposing Sexual Assault, a student group that highlights the importance of men in the anti-sexual assault movement.

Now a national non-profit with chapters in multiple states, PAVE is committed to ending sexual violence through education and empowerment. Angela continues to serve as the organization’s Executive Director. Angela’s passion and energy are coupled with her dedication to shattering the silence of sexual violence. Audiences across the country have benefited from her experiences and her ability to turn her tragedy into triumph.

Stephanie Byrnes

Chapter & Affiliate Director

Stephanie, PAVE leader and incest survivor, graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Madison in 2003 with a degree in Journalism that emphasized Advertising and Public Relations. During college, she became very involved in Women’s issues and eventually became Chair of the University of Wisconsin – Madison’s PAVE Chapter her senior year. Stephanie has also done volunteer work for the National Organization for Women (NOW) where she worked on the Governor/ Lieutenant Governor campaigns for Kathleen Falk and Barbara Lawton in WI. Currently, she works as the Advertising/Marketing Coordinator for a local community bank in Wisconsin while continuing her involvement with National PAVE.

Laura Dunn

Communications Director & Survivor Justice Director

While an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin – Madison, Laura became an outspoken victim of sexual assault. Her passion for victims’ rights was ignited after finding out that Wisconsin still had no legislation on the issue of alcohol-facilitated sexual assaults, making her case virtually unprosecutable. To turn her outrage into activism, Laura became involved with PAVE. She became the PAVE Media Advocate during her senior year of college and was involved with the first Survivor Justice Campaign on behalf of ‘Patty.' After receiving her B.A. in Psychology & Legal Studies, she was accepted into Teach For America in New Orleans, Louisiana. She is currently finishing up her two-year commitment teaching at an inner-city school opened after Hurricane Katrina, while also volunteering for National PAVE.

Susan Love

Marketing Director

Susan earned her MBA in strategy, marketing and international business from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.. She has spent time studying and traveling in India, where she witnessed firsthand the impact of education and meaningful public policy on improving the health and well-being of marginalized people. Before earning her graduate degree, she started a successful catering business that promoted healthy selections for communities struggling to balance nutrition with economic pressures. Through her entrepreneurial experiences, Susan gained awareness on the difficulties survivors face when making constructive changes in their lives. Her commitment to helping others break free from the destructive cycles of violent abuse, shame and shattered lives has brought her to PAVE. Having witnessed law enforcement practices that ignored victim needs, especially in disadvantaged communities, Susan is dedicated to providing energetic support of programs promoting financial independence, education and community activism. She guides PAVE’s marketing development and partner relations activities with an eye toward building stronger survivor support, community awareness and legislative improvement campaigns.

Malissa Davis

Administrative Director

Malissa was a co-worker with Angela Rose when she learned about Roses’ abduction and assault. In support, Malissa attended the sentencing of the perpetrator in Roses’ case. Sitting with the perpetrator’s previous victims and seeing Angela’s passion and activism, Malissa decided to get involved in the movement to end sexual violence. Malissa avidly tracks coverage of sexual assault cases and PAVE’s education and activism in the media. Additionally, she currently is involved with WEAVE (Women Escaping a Violent Environment) while working as a photographer in Sacramento, California.

J.R. Spencer

Director of Technology

J.R. Spencer is a technologist, social media expert, and entrepreneur with an extensive background in Internet and enterprise technology having worked at Yahoo, Kintera, IBM, Oracle and several technology startups. Additionally, J.R is equally passionate about helping to make the world a better place and believes passionately in the power and effectiveness that technology can have in transforming the lives of people by providing them tools and platforms to work, organize, and educate themselves.

EDUCATIONAL OUTREACH COMMITTEE

Jamila Thomas

Campus Outreach Director

Jamila has always been emphatically involved in organizations that uplift women spiritually, emotionally, educationally and physically. Jamila received her undergraduate degree in Business Administration and her MBA from Florida A&M University. Jamila is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. and also on the Future Leaders Council of the YWCA, whose mission is to eliminate racism and empower women. Jamila has been blessed to travel abroad to places such as Africa, Germany, Austria, and England in an effort to raise awareness to cultural differences. In addition, she currently runs a health and wellness business through Arbonne International while also working as an Associate Director for Employee Benefits for a nonprofit organization that provides insurance services to colleges and universities.

Diana Riser

Research Director

Diana graduated with a B.A. in Psychology & Philosophy from the University of Alabama – Huntsville. As a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, she immediately followed her passion of working with survivors of sexual abuse and took a job with Safe Place and Rape Crisis Center (SPARCC) as an educator and then manager of education from 2003 to 2007. At SPARCC, Diana coordinated and provided education on domestic violence, dating violence, rape, child sexual abuse and sexual harassment, as well as provided counseling to teenage and adult survivors of sexual abuse. Currently, Diana is pursuing her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology at Virginia Tech. Her research focuses on risk, resilience, trauma in child and adolescent development, and on pedophilia. Diana hopes to provide greater insight into the occurrence of sexual abuse and subsequent recovery of victims, support for survivors, intervention for offenders and the overall prevention of sexual abuse.

Donna Riemer

Clinical Outreach Director

Donna Riemer became a Board Certified Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse, Registered Nurse Consultant, and Certified Traumatologist to help people and to make a difference. As a nurse manager, she has provided education about sanctuary, trauma, post-traumatic growth, and resilience to both staff and consumers to provide hope that there is life after trauma. As a survivor of childhood family violence, Donna’s resiliency has made her strong and tenacious in her more than 20 years of clinical nursing working with both perpetrators and victims of violence in psychiatric mental health units. Voted as Wisconsin Nurse of the Year in 2000, she is an active member of the American Psychiatric Nursing Association (APNA), and the International Association of Forensic Nursing (IAFN). She has served on the 2007 APNA Seclusion/ Restraint Task Force, the 2008 APNA Workplace Violence Task Force, and currently serves on the Trauma Informed Care Advisory Committee in Madison, Wisconsin. As a published author Donna has detailed her experiences working with a treatment team to reduce violence by over 90% in a 3 year period at a medium security forensics unit. This work significantly reduced the need for more restrictive interventions, which is being replicated in a maximum-security setting through use of non-violent communication skills, recovery focused interventions, and sanctuary concepts in a trauma sensitive environment. Donna continues to work as a Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Manager with civil and forensic patients in a maximum - security psychiatric hospital unit reducing violence and addressing trauma.

Gina Therese Bartucci

Gina is currently in the School Psychology Program at Loyola University Chicago obtaining her Ph.D. She graduated with her undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she started a PAVE chapter in 2002. After graduating, she became an international educator at UIUC and created a workshop specifically for women traveling abroad and the miscommunications that can stem from cross-cultural misunderstandings. Last year she completed her Masters of Education from Loyola, where she began to realize how perfectly her passion for school psychology couples with education and sexual abuse prevention, which has been her major interest for the last 10 years. Currently, Gina belongs to a research team that provides professional development to teachers surrounding Character Education and Positive Behavior Supports, two key components to educating students in the importance of respecting each other and themselves. Respect is a crucial piece in educating our future about sexual assault. Working with PAVE as the Education Director, Gina believes that the key to shattering the silence of sexual violence is working with teachers, parents, students and the community.

Barb Carter

Perpetrator Intervention Director

Since 1982 Barb has provided treatment and intervention for perpetrators of sexual and domestic violence in a variety of settings, from outpatient mental health clinics to county jail environments. Her philosophy on perpetrator accountability is that violence is a choice and not caused by a mental health, medical, addiction, or anger management diagnosis is a passion. Such a belief leads her to hold offenders immediately accountable for their use of negative power and control demonstrated in violence toward others. Currently Barb is a doctorial candidate at XXX beginning her research on organizational violence. Her educational background includes a B.S. in Business Administration and Human Resource Management, a Master in Management and Criminal Justice, and an Oregon State Alcohol and Drug Counseling Certification (CADC II).As the Assistant Program Director at a Domestic Violence Intervention Program she has created along with fellow colleagues she advocates for victim and community safety, based on the most current evidence-based practices, contributes to staff training and development, and promotes community education. As part of her community education Barb emphasizes that a key to ending violence is raising awareness about our society’s collusion with perpetrators, such as when an individual or group knowingly or unknowingly supports offender attitudes and behavior through silence, excuse making, use of verbal and written language, body language, agreement, and/or victim blaming comments.

SOCIAL AWARENESS COMMITTEE:

Julia Pels

LGBTQ Outreach Director

Julia is PAVE's LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer) Director. She attended Columbia College where she earned a degree in Cultural Studies and Theatre, with a focus on Queer Theory and Gender Studies. After graduating, Julia created a one-woman, interactive performance Anthropos, which aims to cultivate social and cultural awareness around the topic of gender, sexuality and violence within the community. Through her performances, Julia makes her audience more acutely aware of stereotypes, hatred and violence. Her passion is to end the ignorance that breeds violence, while also creating solidarity for community members.

Gabe Wright

Male Empowerment Director

At the age of 22, Gabe became a rape victim, an experience that left him confused, hurt, ashamed and angry. Those feelings continued for him until he finally found the courage to speak out as a survivor. Gabe first spoke out in the Red Eye, a local Chicago paper, and later became featured in the ‘The Voices and Faces Project.’ Since then, Gabe has attended a National Male Victimization Conference and spoken at various schools and community agencies about his work as a male rape survivor. Having previously received his bachelor’s degree in Parks and Recreation Administration from Illinois State University, Gabe has gone on to earn his Master’s degree in Higher Education Administration with an emphasis on Student Affairs from Northern Illinois University. At his university, Gabe became instrumental in founding the organization MASIV (Men Against Sexual Interpersonal Violence) that reaches out to various communities within college campuses, speaking out about sexual violence and encouraging men to take an active role in the understanding and prevention of sexual violence. One of Gabe’s many passions is to bring a voice to sexual victimization in deaf communities. He strongly believes that every victim/survivors should be recognized regardless of their race, religion, creed, physical ability, gender or sexual preference since giving survivors their own identity back is a form of empowerment.

Jaime A. Gill

International Faith Director

As a three-time rape survivor, Jaime has moved from feeling cursed and victimized to blessed and empowered through her faith work with PAVE. Jaime believes that God allowed her to survive such painful and traumatic experiences to become a witness to other rape/sexual abuse victims around the world. As a sought after public speaker for youth impact and women empowerment, she has shared her own story to encourage victims to begin the healing process. Currently, Jaime serves as the Television Producer/ Senior Editor for New Faith Baptist Church International in Matteson, IL. Jaime’s ministry takes her across the country and into Africa, often leading to contact with countless victims who feel silenced, scarred, trapped, insecure and afraid. Whether through media or public speaking, Jaime strives to “pave” the way for survivors through her courage and voice.

LEGISLATIVE ISSUES COMMITTEE:

Austin King

Legislative Issues Director

Austin has been active with PAVE since its first meeting on the University of Wisconsin – Madison’s campus in the spring of 2001. Austin served as a male speaker in countless events with PAVE's brother organization, MOSA (Men Opposing Sexual Assault), while also working behind the scenes for PAVE on one of his life's passions: progressive policy and legislation. Together with PAVE founder Angela Rose, Austin developed and guided PAVE's early legislative efforts on fair and humane treatment of survivors. Austin went on to become a Madison, Wisconsin City Council member in 2003, was re-elected in 2005, and served as the Madison City Council’s president in 2006 (becoming the youngest in the city’s 150 year history). While in office, he spearheaded the “Justice for Patty” Resolution that offered a long-overdue apology and compensation from the city to a rape survivor who was disbelieved and vilified upon reporting her assault. The resolution also provided consequences to an unscrupulous law firm that represented the city in her case and it also mandated that the Madison Police review their use of deception and ruses against victims of sensitive crimes. Currently, Austin resides in New Orleans, Louisiana, where he serves as the National Director of the Financial Justice Center for ACORN, the nation's largest community organization of low- and moderate-income families.