Lifetime Television joins the National Network to End Domestic Violence in a salute to Deborah Tucker and Fernando LaGuarda for working together to stop violence against women.

Deborah D. Tucker
Deborah D. Tucker, executive director of the National Center on Domestic and Sexual Violence, has been dedicated to ending violence against women ever since she became a volunteer and then a staff member at the first rape crisis center in Texas in 1973. She directed the first domestic violence shelter in Texas, the Austin Center for Battered Women, from 1977 to 1982. From 1982 until 1996, she directed the Texas Council on Family Violence (TCFV), one of the largest state coalitions, with more than 50 staff members, which provides training and technical assistance, public policy advocacy and public education. TCFV also operates the National Domestic Violence Hotline (800-799-SAFE). In 1996, Tucker joined Sarah M. Buel in opening Tucker, Buel and Associates. In 1998, they co-founded the National Training Center on Domestic and Sexual Violence. Renamed in 2003, the center provides technical assistance and training throughout the nation. Tucker has extensive experience at the national level; she served as founding chair of the National Network to End Domestic Violence during its development and passage of the Violence Against Women Act. She was nationally recognized for her leadership by being awarded the Marshall’s Domestic Violence Peace Prize. Tucker currently serves as co-chair of the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence.

Fernando R. LaGuarda
Fernando R. LaGuarda is a lawyer and chairman of the National Network to End Domestic Violence Fund, which is the leading provider of technical assistance, training and education to advocates, professionals, and others who encounter or serve battered women in their work and communities. LaGuarda is a member of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C., working in the firm’s federal section. Prior to attending law school, LaGuarda was a social worker and spent two years as a health policy analyst in the Massachusetts Governor’s Budget Bureau. He was born in Uruguay and speaks fluent Spanish. LaGuarda is admitted to practice in Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. He received an A.B., cum laude, in government from Harvard College in 1988, and a J.D., cum laude, from Georgetown University in 1994, where he was Notes and Comment Editor of the Georgetown Law Journal.

National Network to End Domestic Violence
www.nnedv.org
National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) is a membership and advocacy organization of state domestic violence coalitions, allied organizations and supportive individuals. NNEDV began in 1990 as a small working group of state domestic violence coalitions and national domestic violence advocates. Then known as the Domestic Violence Coalition on Public Policy, the NNEDV developed policy that would become folded into the Violence Against Women Act of 1994. Under the early stewardship of state coalition leaders from Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Texas and Washington, DC, the group was instrumental in obtaining increased federal support for shelters, services and programs at the highest levels ever since such programs were established. Today, NNEDV is the leading voice among domestic violence advocates in public policy. NNEDV has recently spearheaded efforts through its sister organization, the National Network to End Domestic Violence Fund, to provide more direct support to local programs and coalitions through information, research, funding and training.

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