The Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office named Antoinette Laskey, MD, the first recipient of the Norlin Cruz Child Advocacy Award. The award recognizes individuals who have gone above and beyond to protect the health and safety of Utah’s children.
During a January 16, 2025, presentation in front of the attorney’s office in downtown Salt Lake City, District Attorney Sim Gill presented Laskey with an award and acknowledged her leadership and dedication with the Center for Safe and Healthy Families and Utah Children’s Justice Centers.
The Center for Safe and Healthy Families is a program through Primary Children’s Hospital that’s dedicated to supporting children and families affected by abuse and neglect through medical and mental health services.
“Her singular leadership and the joint efforts of the Center for Safe and Healthy Families is why we are here,” Gill said. “It takes everybody’s effort, all of our collective and communal response to say that we will not tolerate this, and those who engage will be held accountable.”
Laskey, director of the Center for Safe and Healthy Families, has dedicated her career to helping children for more than 20 years. She is a professor of pediatrics at the Spencer Fox Eccles School of Medicine at the University of Utah, fellowship director of child abuse pediatrics, and medical director of the Utah Children’s Justice Centers.
“As a pediatrician, I’ve always been committed to taking care of children and ensuring that they have a safe, stable, and nurturing environment in which to grow and thrive,” Laskey said. “Unfortunately, not all families are able to provide that. And worse, in some families, they actually cause pain and real harm to their children. When this happens, it’s the responsibility of the adults in their lives to do something, to say something, and to care enough to intervene.”
The center collaborates with medical colleagues and community partners, including law enforcement, child welfare, mental health specialists, and trauma therapists, to appropriately evaluate and diagnose each child.
“I’m so proud to be part of the multidisciplinary teams in the state who come together for the common purpose of helping a child and their family at what might be the worst time in their life,” Laskey said. “I’m proud of our children’s justice centers, which are a shining example of how things can be done when we put the child at the center of all of our efforts.”
The Norlin Cruz Child Advocacy Award was created in 2023 to recognize the work of individuals who advocate for children. The award is named after 6-year-old Norlin Cruz, who was abused by his own mother and died in her care. Every year, about 2,000 children die from abuse or neglect in the United States.
“Norlin deserved to be remembered for much longer than his short life, so we made a commitment to make this award in his name so he can live a little bit longer,” Gill said.
Laskey took part of a tree planting ceremony to honor and remember Norlin, along with other victims and survivors of child abuse and neglect. The evergreen will stand as a daily reminder of the commitment to giving victims a voice and protecting the community’s most vulnerable.
