Helen “Nellie” Fitzpatrick is a member of both the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office and the city’s LGBT community — and in her new position will be working to open the lines of communication between the two.
The DA’s office announced last week that Fitzgerald will serve as the office’s first LGBT liaison.
Fitzpatrick, 31, came to the city in 2008 from her native Florida to work as an assistant district attorney in the Philadelphia Municipal Court division and later moved to the Family Violence and Sexual Assault Unit.
A 2002 graduate of the University of Florida, Fitzpatrick earned her law degree from the Florida Coastal School of Law in 2008.
While she had an initial goal of working in the legal area of the music industry, her focus shifted in part because of her active involvement in the LGBT community.
“It wasn’t until I started law school that I saw that there were so many more important causes out there that appealed to me, like criminal prosecution. I wanted to work with victims and especially victims in the LGBT community,” she said. “Often, the needs, concerns and fears that LGBT victims have in relation to the criminal-justice process are not recognized or addressed, and I saw that happening in Florida when I was in school. It was frustrating and it was something that I brought with me to Philadelphia.”
Since joining the DA’s office, Fitzpatrick said she has been open about her sexual orientation and vocal about the unmet needs of LGBT victims, serving as an unofficial clearinghouse for other ADAs working with such clients.
“If someone has a victim that they’re able to determine is a member of the community, they have come to me asking if there’s anything they should be doing, anything they should be keeping in mind. There have been cases where a victim has not wanted to participate in the process because of fears, and I’ve gone and talked to them,” she said.
While many LGBT victims may have concerns over working with the system, efforts to allay those fears have been challenging, Fitzpatrick said, partially because of the inherent difficulty in identifying LGBT victims.
“It’s very hard to recognize someone as a member of the LGBT community because we’re of all different races, religions, colors, socioeconomic statuses. It’s easy to go into a courtroom and see someone from Cambodia who needs an interpreter, but it’s not as easy to see a courtroom with an LGBT person and see what their individual needs are and what they may be fearful of or questioning,” she said. “I started speaking up about this, and when [DA] Seth [Williams] took office, he really wanted the office to have more of a presence in the community because he recognized that there is this very large community that is basically silent.”
The office announced last year that it was creating the liaison position, and Fitzpatrick jumped at the chance to bridge the gap between her two respective communities.
The position is volunteer, and Fitzpatrick will be tasked with balancing it on top of her full caseload as an ADA, a welcome challenge, she said.
“This is something that’s so important to me that, regardless of the pressure it’ll put on me or the time constraints, it’s something I’m really looking forward to taking on,” she said.
As liaison, Fitzpatrick said her primary function will be to serve as a resource and outlet for LGBTs in the city who have any questions or concerns about interacting with any aspect of the criminal-justice system.
“I want to meet with anyone and everyone who wants to speak with me,” she said. “I’ll be there to address any concerns community members have, to answer any questions they have and to help them communicate in any way with the [DA’s] office. The most important thing I’ll be doing is making sure people know that the DA’s office is actively present in the community and that, if they have any type of problem at all, I’m here, we’re here and we’re available to help them address their issues.”
Fitzpatrick is in the process of setting up meetings with the city’s director of LGBT affairs and the police LGBT liaison.
She also plans to develop LGBT educational opportunities for both the DA’s office and the police department and will work to help build the case for a statewide LGBT-inclusive hate-crimes law.
“I want to use this opportunity to start to accurately and aggressively monitor crimes that are hate-based and that are affecting the LGBT community,” she said. “We need to be using that information to not only work toward successful prosecution but also to look at the bigger issue, which is why we still do not have legislation that protects members of our community from hate crimes. That is completely unacceptable.”
While Fitzpatrick will be challenged with building the liaison position from the ground up, she said she will be doing so with the full backing of the DA’s office.
“We have so much support from the office for this,” she said. “Many people have come to me and sent me emails saying they’re so proud that we’re doing this and offering to volunteer their time to help in any way, shape or form. And these are not just members of our community, but everyone from people who have been in the office for 20 years to people brand new to the DA’s office.”
To contact Fitzpatrick, email [email protected] or call 215-686-8093.
Jen Colletta can be reached at [email protected].