by Senator Whitney Westerfield
In 2018, the General Assembly and Kentucky voters demonstrated their strong support for crime victims when they overwhelmingly adopted the Marsy’s Law constitutional amendment. Their intent was as clear as their message: “you deserve better, we support you, and your voice matters”. Victims were able to breathe a sigh of relief knowing they would finally be afforded the same level of constitutional protections as the accused and convicted.
But their hopes were soon dashed by a last-minute legal challenge—not on the merits of Marsy’s Law, but on a mere technicality—prompting a Supreme Court ruling which ignored more than a hundred years of established legal precedent. And with that, victims were once again left behind by the very system put in place to protect them.