Crime victims, survivors remembered at VOCAL vigil [Video]

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WSFA) – Victims of Crime and Leniency, also known as VOCAL, held its annual candlelight vigil in downtown Montgomery Friday.

Families of crime victims and crime survivors gathered outside the attorney general’s office to remember the people who died at the hands of gun violence, left home and never returned, or other tragic circumstances.

Crime in Alabama, a database built by Alabama Law Enforcement Agency and the University of Alabama Culverhouse College of Business, reported 13,848 violent crimes in the state for 2022.

VOCAL Executive Director Wanda Miller said each crime has a victim and their stories, which will never go untold.

“We should never get to a point where we don’t remember what they’ve been through and just think of them as just a witness or someone that something happened to,” said Miller.

Blount County District Attorney Pamela Casey called on victims’ families to turn their pain …