Gov. Cuomo Calls for Law to Extend Statute of Limitations for Child Abuse

WHEC
January 13, 2017

http://www.whec.com/news/statute-of-limitations-governor-cuomo-child-abuse/4370692/

[with video]

A sex abuse survivor says child victims deserve more time to speak up or file a lawsuit against their abuser.

To do that, it would take a new state law and that's what Governor Cuomo is asking for.

During one of his State of the State addresses this week, he publicly supported giving victims a longer time period to accuse their abuser in court or bring a lawsuit against an institution. But some fear this could bankrupt school districts, churches or synagogues.

Right now, a victim of child sex abuse has until their 23rd birthday to accuse their abuser of a crime. After that, the statute of limitations runs out. For years, advocates have tried to change the laws, but it's always been stopped in the legislature.

Now, because of the governor's support, they think victims will finally get what they deserve.

Jill Knittel is a financial advisor in Rochester who was in her forties before she admitted in public that she was a victim of child sex abuse from the age of 6 to 13. By then, the statute of limitation to prosecute her abuser had run out.

"For me, when it was time for me to get counseling and to be okay and be strong enough to fight, the time period I could fight was over," says Knittel.

She hopes extending the time period for both criminal prosecution and filing civil lawsuits will help heal all victims. Governor Cuomo is proposing eliminating the statute of limitations on the criminal side all together and allowing civil claims to be filed up to 50 years after the offense. But there is a fear that would bankrupt the Catholic Dioceses still struggling in the wake of sex abuse scandals revealed in movies like "Spotlight."

"50-year-old cases are very tough to defend against," says Dennis Poust of NYS Catholic Conference. "You don't have witnesses or physical evidence or anything to really go on and so you are forced into large scale settlements."

That spokesman says the church already offers counseling and support to victims outside of court and the church approves of extending the statutes for cases going forward -- in other words future cases.

But advocates say that's not fair. In the past 12 years, more than 14,000 children have been screened for sex abuse through the Bivona Child Advocacy Center.

"The survivors we talk to, it is not about one penny," says Mary Whittier of Bivona. "It is about holding offenders accountable, it is about justice, it's about validating for them what occurred many years ago."

Besides extending the time periods for civil and criminal court cases, the governor also wants public institutions to be liable for its employee actions. Right now, for example, school districts are pretty much exempt because you have just months to file lawsuits, so changing the law to include private and public institutions would help kids who might have been abused by teachers or coaches to be held accountable -- even years later.