Founder’s Story
I never set out to build a foundation. I set out to keep a promise.
In 1992, my childhood friend, Angel Ormston, was kidnapped and murdered. We grew up in the same neighborhood. We had matching turtles. She was four years older — the big-sister figure I adored. Her loss shattered our community, and it shaped the rest of my life.
Years later, when her case came up for parole, I stepped forward as the family spokesperson. I prepared the case, gathered letters, worked with media, and walked into those hearings determined to make sure Angel’s life still spoke.
We won two maximum-sentence reconsiderations — one in 2013 and another in 2023. Calling her family both times will always be among the greatest moments of my life.
But something else happened along the way:
I saw the gap.
The silence after the hearing.
The years of waiting.
The systems families are expected to navigate alone.
I understood — deeply — that justice takes decades, but support often ends after the headline.
Becoming a Victim Myself
In 2019, my world broke open again. I became a victim of domestic violence when a physician intervened and reported a plan to harm me and my two sons. I survived because someone spoke up — someone who understood the signs and took them seriously.
Suddenly, I wasn’t the advocate. I was the victim.
I knew the fear of sitting in a room hearing things you can’t process.
I knew the exhaustion of navigating courtrooms, police reports, and safety plans.
I knew what it felt like when the system twists your stomach and steals your sleep.
That experience changed me.
It connected every part of my life — my work, my advocacy, my story — in a way I couldn’t ignore.
The Professional Experience That Made the Mission Possible
For more than fifteen years, I’ve worked as a nonprofit CFO/COO, building programs, stabilizing organizations, supporting families, and creating systems of care. I understand the mechanics — the funding, the services, the gaps, the accountability — and I know what it takes to build something that lasts.
My personal advocacy taught me the heart of this work.
My victim experience taught me the urgency.
My nonprofit career taught me the structure.
Together, those three pieces became clarity: If no organization existed to help families through the long journey of justice, then I would build one.
Changing Angel’s Story
For decades, Angel was known by the worst moment of her life — “the girl murdered by Mark Sotka.” I promised her family that would not be her legacy.
Now, through the scholarship in her name and this Foundation built in her honor, Angel becomes a light for families walking through darkness, a source of support, compassion, and resilience.
Her story becomes the reason another family won’t go through this alone.
And that is how she is remembered.
That is the promise — kept.
Why A Promise Kept™ Exists
A Promise Kept™ Foundation was born from three truths:
I know what it feels like to fight for justice as a family member.
I know what it feels like to become a victim myself.
I know how nonprofits can build systems that change lives.
This Foundation is where lived experience, professional expertise, and a decades-old promise meet to serve others.
We stand in the gap when the system is overwhelming.
We show up when the waiting feels impossible.
We carry the weight so families don’t have to.
And we stay as long as they need us.
Because every family deserves someone in their corner.
Because love is the legacy.
And because a promise kept can change everything.