Our Staff
The Office of Victim Assistance: Main number 303-492-8855
General email: assist@colorado.edu
The Office of Victim Assistance is located on the second floor of the north side of Willard Hall Rooms 217, 218, 219.
Mary Friedrichs, LCSW, Director – 303-735-4866
Mary became the Director of the Office of Victim Assistance in June, 2005. She started working in the movement to end violence against women in 1972, when she helped to build the Los Angeles Commission on Assaults Against Women. She has been active in social justice work for 30 years, having been involved in movements and issues fighting racism, sexism and heterosexism. From 1980 until she came to CU, Mary worked in private practice and in the Counseling Center at Colorado College in Colorado Springs. She has taught at Colorado College and at UCCS. Having long specialized clinically in working with survivors of sexual and other traumas, Mary is committed to an expanded conception of response services with the goal of attaining just outcomes for all people who get hurt due to their membership in a group which historically does not share equal access to power and resources.
Jessica Ladd-Webert, MS, LPC, Client Services Coordinator – 303-735-2323
Jessica started at Victim Assistance in October 2007. She is familiar with the University of Colorado because she received her undergraduate degree in Psychology here. She then went on to earn a Master’s degree in Counseling from the University of Phoenix. While working on her master’s degree she interned as a counselor at Access Counseling, a non-profit counseling center in Boulder. Jessica has experience as an addiction counselor at the Boulder County Addiction Recovery Center. She has also worked as a contract therapist at MESA, Moving to End Sexual Assault, Boulder’s rape crisis center, from the year 2008-2009 and the year before that she was MESA’s client services coordinator. She continues her work with MESA as a volunteer hotline counselor and supervisor, which she has done since the spring of 2004. Jessica is also a part of the volunteer victim advocates for the Boulder Sheriff’s Office since April of 2003. Her career has always focused on crisis and trauma work and she continues to bring her skills of therapy and advocacy to support the CU community. Jessica is also a State Licensed Therapist.
Davian Gagne, MSW, Gender Violence Prevention and Education Coordinator – 303-492-5951
Davian began working with the Office of Victim Assistance in July, 2008. She received a bachelor of psychology and a Master of Social Work from the University of Denver. Prior to joining the University of Colorado, she worked for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment as the Data Analyst and Program Evaluator for the Sexual Assault Prevention Program. In this capacity she managed various sexual violence evaluation projects with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She also worked for Moving to End Sexual Assault in Boulder as the Prevention Education Coordinator. In this role, she developed gender violence prevention curricula for the peer education program which she supervised. Davian has been working in the anti-violence movement for over four years and continues doing this work in both her professional and personal life.
Ruchi Malhotra, MS, Victim Advocate -303-492-2235
Ruchi joined the Office of Victim Assistance in May 2009. She attended University of Colorado for her undergraduate degree in Sociology. During this time, she worked as the Cultural Resources Coordinator at the Women’s Resource Center and the Programmer for the Student Outreach and Retention Center for Equity (SORCE). Additionally, Ruchi was a member of the Multicultural Development Team within Counseling and Psychological Services. Ruchi then completed a master’s in Mental Health and Counseling at Southern Oregon University. While in graduate school, Ruchi was a counseling intern with the Counseling Center and the Queer Resource Center. Her counseling experience includes facilitating support groups for international women, transgender students, and women facing intimate partner violence. While in Oregon, Ruchi provided therapy to youth, young adults and families facing economic hardship, family conflict and abuse. Ruchi is passionate about exploring methods for healing from trauma and advocating for those experiencing various forms of oppression.
Mailing address for all staff:
Office of Victim Assistance
University of Colorado at Boulder
UCB 140
Boulder, Colorado 80309-0140
Portions of this project were supported by grant #2004-WA-AX-0005 awarded by the Office of Violence Against Women, Office of Justice Programs, US Dept of Justice. The opinions, findings, conclusions, and recommendations expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women.
