Bill to extend statue of limitations for sex-abuse lawsuits faces key vote tonight

PROVIDENCE 2019--PROVIDENCE -- A key legislative committee is scheduled to vote Tuesday night on a bill to give the victims of childhood sexual abuse more time to sue their abusers, and the institutions that failed to protect the victims.

At its most basic, the legislation unveiled over the holiday weekend extends from seven to 35 years the statute of limitations on the pursuit of legal claims by adults against priests, Boy Scout leaders, teachers, coaches and others who sexually abused them as children.

There is, also an opportunity for people -- unaware until even later in life of the harm they suffered -- to file claims within seven years of making the connection, or more specifically: "seven years from the time the victim discovered or reasonably should have discovered that the injury or condition was caused by the act."

Victims of child sexual abuse who missed deadlines for filing civil claims against their abusers would have had a three-year window to bring old cases to court under the original version of the legislation that Rep. Carol McEntee, D-South Kingstown, introduced this year.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence and the insurance industry fought the proposed "revival window'' behind the scenes. Key lawmakers also voiced concern about the constitutionality of the window. They hung their arguments on a 1996 decision in a case known as Kelly v. Marcantonio "rising out of the alleged sexual molestation of minors by priests of the Catholic Church."

The diocese said: "The bill is not targeted at abusers or abuse but at expanding opportunities to file monetary lawsuits against a limited set of third parties who may have served as employers or for whom an assailant may have volunteered."

The reworked bill effectively lets the church and other "non-perpetrator defendants" off the hook for decades of past abuses, for which the statute of limitations has expired. It does so by making a distinction between the molesters and the institutions that by "negligent supervision," or concealment, "caused or contributed" to the abuse.

"As to a perpetrator defendant," it says, "any claim or cause of action based on conduct of sexual abuse may be commenced" within 35 years of reaching adulthood, "regardless if the claim was time-barred under previous version of the general laws."

Against "non perpetrator defendants [whose] conduct caused or contributed to the childhood sexual abuse by another person," there is an opportunity for the filing of civil claims, but not those "time-barred" under current law because the current statute of limitations has expired.

Many of the abusers accused by their victims at televised House and Senate hearings both this year and last year are dead, including the priest publicly named by McEntee's sister, Ann Hagan Webb; and another named by Margaret McKenna, a civil-rights lawyer and former president of Lesley University.

In February, in an effort to demonstrate to Rhode Island lawmakers how seriously the church takes sexual misconduct allegations, an arm of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence acknowledged paying "over $21 million in legal settlements," and another $2.3 million for counseling to "resolve" more than 130 claims of abuse by clergy, in church-run schools and parishes.

The diocese reported the payouts in written testimony filed with the House Judiciary Committee in advance of a hearing on the McEntee legislation.

The diocese did not spell out the time period the 130 claims encompassed or the number of victims to whom the settlements were paid. Nor did it name the priests or church staff implicated in these long-hidden crimes.

It also cited cooperation with the Rhode Island State Police since 2011, before Bishop Thomas J. Tobin in August 2016 signed a letter of understanding with then-Attorney General Peter Kilmartin pledging to report allegations to the state police.

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