Remarks By Robyn Thiemann To Project Safe Neighborhood Conference 2007 Working Lunch
Atlanta, Georgia – September 26, 2007

MS. THIEMANN: Good afternoon, everyone. I hope you have enjoyed your lunch.

I am here to unveil our new Project Safe Neighborhood public service announcements. It was created by the Mullen Agency from Boston and the Ad Council.

Project Safe Neighborhood has partnered with both Mullen and the Ad Council since about 2002, when we started working on our first PSA entitled, Mothers. And you saw that advertisement this morning in our opening video.

The new creative work that you'll see today constitutes the fourth addition to the Reducing Gun Violence campaign which so far has garnered $133 million in donated media time and space.

The series of PSAs that we worked up for this initiative illustrates the consequences of gun crimes on the families of those who commit them. Each concludes with the tag line, "Gun crimes hit home."

Back in 2001 when we first started talking with the Ad Council and Mullen about creating these announcements, they had quite a tough sell trying to get the Department of Justice to embrace that softer message, "Gun crimes hit home." We, of course, were looking for something a little bit more hard hitting, like the tag line that played so well in so many of our local advertisements. And that was, "Gun crime means hard time." So we had to be convinced that that softer message and appeal to the effect on the offender's family was the right one for our national campaign.

I had the opportunity to travel with the Ad Council and with Mullen as we did research with the target audience, people in prison for gun crimes. I walked into those sessions assuming that that hard time message was going to be the one that resonated most. In a way, it was. Just not quite in the way that I had expected.

The meaning of hard time became clear as I sat across the gang leader tattooed with the tears, evidence of his violent past, and I listened to him talk about the fact that his mother was diagnosed with cancer just three months into his sentence. And then I watched the real tears run down his face as he explained that he couldn't help her, there was nothing that he could do from inside the prison walls, and that he knew that she would die before he got out.

Every person that we spoke with in those research sessions identified the separation from their family as the most painful effect of incarceration. And each of them in their own way explained that if they had known how hard the time would be, they might have thought twice.

So while the threat of incarceration is certainly a deterrent, one way that we can reach this population is by focusing on the negative consequences that their actions have on their family. These new television spots continue that emotional appeal by highlighting the effects of being incarcerated for a gun crime. These spots will be distributed in both English and Spanish.

And I would like to take a look at the two television spots now.

[Advertisements played.]

(Applause.)

MS. THIEMANN: While the television ad uses professional actors, the radio ads you're about to hear are from real people, real prisoners and their families. I want to say a special thank you to AUSA Hydee Hawkins (phonetic) from the Eastern District of Kentucky and Kim Dammers (phonetic) from the Northern District of Georgia for their assistance in identifying eligible participants for these ads. We also received considerable cooperation from the bureau of prisons, the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service to bring together these prisoners and their family members for the production of these ads.

In addition to the television spots you've just seen, today we will be releasing three radio spots. These capture actual conversations between prisoners and their families. We can listen to one of those radio ads now.

[Advertisement played.]

(Applause.)

MS. THIEMANN: These ads will be rolled out at both the national and local level by the Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs and the Ad Council.

Let me take a moment to thank the Ad Council for their continued support of Project Safe Neighborhoods and a special thanks to CeCe Wiedel (phonetic), who is here today, for her hard work on this campaign. Without the Ad Council's support, not only would we not have been able to produce these ads, but we wouldn't have garnered the 133 million of donated time that we have received so far.

So if you wouldn't mind, please join me in thanking CeCe and the Ad Council and the Mullen Agency. (Applause.)

Each United States Attorneys Office will receive a copy of these ads for your office use, for sharing with your PSN partners and for use at your local --

(End of recording.)

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