Witness (organization)

WITNESS is a human rights non-profit organization based out of Brooklyn, New York. Its mission is to partner with on-the-ground organizations to support the documentation of human rights violations and their consequences, in order to further public engagement, policy change, and justice.Witness has partnered with more than 300 human rights groups in over 80 countries.

WITNESS is an international organization that trains and supports people using video in their fight for human rights. Every day, activists and citizens risk their lives to expose the truth. We help make sure their efforts aren’t in vain. WITNESS is a leader of a global movement that uses video to create human rights change.

Witness was founded in 1992 by Peter Gabriel, along with the help of Human Rights First (then known as the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights) and its founding executive director Michael Posner.

Musician and activist Peter Gabriel was influenced by his experience using a Sony Handycam, one of the first small camcorders marketed to consumers, to record the stories he heard while traveling with Amnesty International’s 1988 Human Rights Now! Tour. He decided to found Witness after the 1991 police brutality incident involving Rodney King, Jr., in which a bystander's video of King's beating by the Los Angeles police was critical both in raising awareness and in generating widespread public attention. To Gabriel, this video demonstrated the power of video to capture the world’s attention and viscerally communicate human rights abuses.

WITNESS was founded the next year, in 1992, with a one million dollar seed grant from the Reebok Human Rights Foundation and a partnership with the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (now Human Rights First). In 2001, WITNESS became an independent nonprofit organization. In 2012, WITNESS released a 20 year timeline about the organization.

In 2004, WITNESS started hosting a benefit dinner and concert called "Focus for Change." The event brings together video activists, funders, and celebrities to share the work of WITNESS' partners.

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