Janet Bessa (Buell) has been married to Bill Buell for 44 years and they have three children, five grandchildren and one great granddaughter. Janet has a BA in Communications and an MA in Divinity and is an ordained minister and a certified trauma counselor. She lives in San Juan Capistrano, CA, and loves playing with the grandchildren, reading, and doing research.

Janet has written eight books, most of them on subjects related to trauma counseling, including several books used in training programs for new trauma counselors. She retired from her day job last year and is currently serving a one-year term on the Orange County Grand Jury. After that she plans to do lots of traveling and work on cultivating her garden.

Note:  On March 17, 2009 while serving on the Orange County Grand Jury Janet spoke at a press conference held to release the latest Orange County Grand Jury report on the subject of gang prevention and intervention.

A video of a portion of the press conference showed up on YouTube at the following URL: www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQUtW1Y-ciI. The entire report can be found here: Education of Parents in the Development of Strategies to Keep Their Children Out of Gangs (a 12 page pdf file - Adobe Acrobat Reader needed).

For information on Janet's books, go to her website at www.innovationspress.net

Front row - granddaughter, Michelle Onstad, age 18: Middle row l to r - daughter, Stephanie Onstad,
age 40; daughter-in-law, Tiffany Buell, age 36; grandson, Trevor Buell, age 6; granddaughter, Emily
Buell, age 8; Me, daughter, Monica Buell, age 41: Top row l to r - son-in-law, David Onstad, age 41;
son, David Buell, age 39; husband, Bill; grandsons Matthew Onstad, age 20, and Ben Onstad, age 16.
  ~2006~