Service Women's Action Network Announces Keynote and Award Recipients at Historic Summit on Military Sexual Violence

Mary Lauterbach, Mother of U.S. Marine Maria Lauterbach, to Keynote Event, Present Awards to Reps. Tsongas and Turner, Senators Collins and Kerry

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Service Women's Action Network (SWAN) announced the keynote speaker and award recipients for the first gathering of Navy, Army, Air Force and Marine veteran sexual assault survivors in the nation’s capital, “Truth and Justice: The 2012 Summit on Military Sexual Violence.”

The Summit, held in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, May 8, will provide military sexual assault survivors and their families the opportunity to share personal experiences with Members of Congress. The day will begin with remarks from Members of Congress, a veterans panel on resilience and reintegration, and a law and policy panel on strategies for system reform.

An awards ceremony will follow, keynoted by Mary Lauterbach, the mother of Marine Lance Corporal, Maria Lauterbach, who was 20 years old when she was murdered in 2007 by a fellow Marine accused of raping her only weeks before. Since her daughter’s death, Mary has been actively working to increase awareness of sexual assault in the military and to improve both the care and justice that service members receive when sexually assaulted.

Following the keynote, The Lauterbach Award for Truth and Justice, a distinction recognizing sustained commitment to the elimination of sexual violence in the military, will be presented to Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-MA), Rep. Michael Turner (R-OH), Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Sen. John Kerry (D-MA). Last year, Rep. Tsongas and Rep. Turner introduced the Defense Sexual Trauma Response Oversight and Good Governance (STRONG) Act, which then received Senate support from Sen. Collins and Sen. Kerry. Elements of this legislation were introduced into law through the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama last December. These included key reforms such as expedited base transfers for sexual assault survivors and retention of evidence in unrestricted sexual assault investigations for 50 years.

After the awards ceremony, more than 100 survivors participating in the Summit will attend advocacy training and then mobilize at the U.S. Capitol to share their personal experiences with their own elected officials. These visits to policymakers will take place one day before the House Armed Services Committee begins full mark-up of the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which contains additional proposals for reforming military sexual assault investigations and prosecutions.

For more information on SWAN's "Truth and Justice: The 2012 Summit on Military Sexual Violence," visit www.truthandjusticesummit.org or contact Katy Otto at

katy@servicewomen.org or 240-478-9387.

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SWAN is a national civil rights organization founded and led by women veterans. SWAN’s vision is to transform military culture by securing equal opportunity and the freedom to serve in uniform without threat of harassment, discrimination, intimidation or assault. SWAN also seeks to reform veterans' services on a national scale to guarantee equal access to quality health care, benefits and resources for women veterans and their families. You can follow Service Women’s Action Network on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/servicewomen, or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/servicewomen.