THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 10, 1994 TAG: 9406100669
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOSEPH P. COSCO, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940610 LENGTH: VIRGINIA BEACH
Disillusioned with the justice system, Jack and Joan Uhlar formed a victim advocacy group that was as much therapy for themselves as for the other families who would come to rely on Justice for Victims of Crime.
{REST} Joan Uhlar still won't give up now that her husband is dead, succumbing in May after a long, nasty cancer that sapped his strength, but not his fighting spirit for victims' rights.
Having lost a son, Joan Uhlar finds herself struggling with the loss of not only her husband of 46 years, but the driving force behind the victims' rights group.
Still, she won't give up the fight.
``I thought I would die, that I would bleed to death,'' she says, recalling her feelings after her 33-year-old-son Bobby was killed at the Oceanfront.
``If someone killed your child, surely you would die. How could you get up in the morning and cook breakfast when
someone shot your son to death?
``But if I didn't die when someone shot my son to death, I knew I wouldn't die when my husband died.''
At age 62, Uhlar has no intention of retiring from Justice for Victims of Crime, though there are up to 50 core volunteers capable of continuing the work.
Next week, Uhlar will attend a hearing in Portsmouth on Gov. George F. Allen's no-parole proposal. She won't speak, though, because she is afraid she would cry. For her son or her husband, or both, she did not say.
``I think what the group will miss most is Jack's drive. He was a very driven man,'' Uhlar says. ``What Jack wanted me to let the group know is, `Don't burn out.' ''
John G. ``Jack'' Uhlar showed his drive early when he wooed and won Joan, the daughter of his Army commanding officer in Alaska. They were married one month shy of Joan's 16th birthday.
``Jack always said that's why he got out of the Army as a private,'' Joan Uhlar jokes.
The couple eventually settled in the Great Neck section of Virginia Beach, not far from Joan's native Berkley. Jack worked as a field representative for the Social Security Administration and served as president of the federal employees' union local; Joan worked as a nurse. Five children followed.
Then Bobby was killed. He went out one night to eat at the Oceanfront and never returned. Police found his body the next day.
``It was an ordinary murder of an ordinary guy with some extraordinary qualities, but it completely devastated us,'' Uhlar says. ``It nearly killed Jack.''
A year and a half later, the killer, a teenager with a history of petty crime, was convicted and sentenced to 62 years. A girl who was with the killer pleaded guilty, was sentenced to 20 years, with five suspended, and has since been paroled.
As potential witnesses in the murder trial, Jack and Joan Uhlar were barred from the courtroom. They later attended the murderer's subsequent court appearances on unrelated charges of burglary, forgery and other offenses. But through it all, the Uhlars felt as though the court system treated them like invisible, mute ghosts.
Many times the couple showed up in court only to discover that the case had been postponed. Prosecutors didn't consult the Uhlars when they offered the killer a plea bargain that he ultimately rejected.
``Jack was so galvanized by the injustices he perceived in the process,'' Uhlar says. ``He thought of the group as a way to give victims a voice, so they'll be visible.
``I think it gave Jack a reason to live. It got him out of the house and helped him focus on other people's problems. And when Jack went into the cemetery and I went into the cemetery, we could tell Bobby, `We're doing something. We're trying to help other people.' ''
The Uhlars developed an all-volunteer organization that offers support, acts as a clearinghouse for information and pushes for legal reforms. Members pay annual dues of $10, but the group's services are free. One effort involves helping victims' families petition the state parole board to keep killers in prison.
Group members also speak at conferences and legislative committee hearings, publish a quarterly newsletter and hold a memorial service for murder victims once a year.
``You can think of any way you can kill somebody, and I have friends who lost some loved one that way,'' Uhlar says.
Group vice chairman Dot Soule of Virginia Beach is one of those friends. Her son, Paul, was stabbed to death in Suffolk High School in 1979.
``Jack and Joan have been the driving force behind the group,'' Soule says. ``It's through their inspiration that the rest of us have really gotten into it. Our group is one that we would give everything in the world not to be in.''
Brenda Stewart of Virginia Beach is another Uhlar friend.
A charter member and treasurer of Justice for Victims of Crime, Stewart met the Uhlars when her 16-year-old son, Billy, was killed 15 months after Bobby Uhlar.
``They showed so much compassion for us and even went to Boydton with us and spent three days there with us'' for the trial of Billy's killer, Stewart says. ``For me, Joan was always a person who I could call and talk to if I was having a down day. She's never too busy to talk to you.
``Jack was always the one who had all the enthusiasm to keep things going. Joan was always the quiet one, but they both worked hard. I guess we just thought that things happened, but now I know that it was Jack and Joan who made the things happen.''
Despite his debilitating disease - cancer of the tongue and throat - Jack Uhlar continued to make things happen for the last few years of his life.
``Until he just couldn't get out, he was out there, limping and doing it. Farm Fresh was his social outlet. He talked to people. He got parole petitions signed. He bugged everyone,'' Joan Uhlar says. ``I'm proud of what Jack did, taking all that anger and all that grief, and doing something with it.''
{KEYWORDS} VICTIM ADVOCATES VICTIM'S RIGHTS
by CNB