Adam Chelette
9 June 2016
​
BRAVE
​
Baton Rouge’s district attorney Hillar Moore talked at LSU’s journalism building to discuss his foundation called Baton Rouge Area Violence Elimination, otherwise known as BRAVE.
BRAVE is a foundation created by Moore in 2011, and when asked if he was the reason for its success he said that i dosent want full credit but will take whatever credit is given to him. Moore decided to create this program when he was informed of violence in Baton Rouge caused by small gangs called groups.
Moore recognized the problem by saying, “Baton Rouge is a big city with big problems.” because of this he knew it was not going to be easy but he knew that doing this program would be better than nothing.
The way the program worked was by giving criminals in the group's fair warning that this was not the path that they wanted to take. It gave members a second chance and made it easier to arrest the main group members that were the cause of all the violence.
Moore’s plan faced heavy criticism at the beginning, but proved to be effective with a significant decrease in Baton Rouge’s murder rate after its first year. “We’ve now identified that we have a problem and plan to fix that problem,” he stated.
Despite all the criticism at its start BRAVE continues to help the development of the town of Baton Rouge. Moore also said that everyone makes mistakes, but it is up to others to forgive us for our mistakes.
