Editorial: Pennsylvania lawmakers deliver victory, if an incomplete one, to victims of childhood sexual abuse

Lancaster Online
November 24, 2019

https://bit.ly/37AmorS

Roman Catholic Diocese of Harrisburg Bishop Ronald W. Gainer addresses the issue of clergy sexual abuse at a news conference on Aug. 1, 2018. Photo by BLAINE SHAHAN

More than a year after a landmark grand jury report detailed a decadeslong cover-up of child sexual abuse in six Pennsylvania Roman Catholic dioceses, the Republican-led state General Assembly finally has passed statutes of limitations reform that offers relief to victims of such abuse. As The Associated Press reported last week, the state Senate passed House Bill 962 on Wednesday, and the House passed it Thursday, sending it to the desk of Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, who is expected to sign it early this week, his spokesman, J.J. Abbott, said.

This is not a complete victory for victims of child sexual abuse, but it is a significant one.

Under current law, victims have only until their 30th birthday to file civil claims against those who abused them and those who enabled their abuse.

That’s not nearly enough time, as we’ve argued repeatedly. It can take decades before a victim is able to understand what was done to him or her during childhood. Because of the terrible trauma involved, delayed reporting in such cases is normal.

Under this new law, victims will have until they turn 55 to file civil claims.

That will apply only, however, to victims of childhood sexual abuse for whom the civil statute of limitations has not yet expired.

And the existing criminal statute of limitations will be eliminated, but only for future cases. Nevertheless, this is an important change.

In 2018, Philly.com interviewed a former priest named James Faluszczak, who said he was abused as a child by a priest in the Diocese of Erie. He noted that there is no statute of limitations on the crime of murder. “This is the murder of a soul,” Faluszczak said, searingly.

He was right, of course. The sexual abuse of children is a crime with terrible, life-altering repercussions for its victims. Ending the criminal statute of limitations for these cases is a wise and just move.

House Bill 962 also offers a remedy for adults younger than 24 who are sexually assaulted: While in the past, such victims had 12 years in which criminal charges could be filed, they now will have 20 years.

(If a victim is uncertain about whether a case can be filed, he or she should contact the victims services office in the local district attorney’s office.)

The legislation also erases legal immunity for governmental institutions, such as public schools, if the person suing was harmed by the institution’s negligence.

House Bill 962 was championed by state Rep. Mark Rozzi, a Berks County Democrat.

Through the grueling battle for statute of limitations reform — a battle in which one of his main adversaries was the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference, the public affairs arm of this state’s bishops — Rozzi was fueled by a righteous anger.

He was raped by a Catholic priest when he was just 13. The civil statute of limitations had expired in his case before he even knew such a statute existed.

Older victims like Rozzi won’t be helped by House Bill 962. Their hopes now rest in another bill passed in both chambers last week, HB 963, which would amend the state Constitution and open a retroactive two-year window so that victims who have aged out of the current statute of limitations could press civil claims.

This addresses the concern of some lawmakers that a retroactive window would be unconstitutional.

The bill will need to pass — in exactly the same form — in the House and Senate again in the 2021-22 legislative session, so an amendment can be placed on the ballot.

“I remain committed to fighting for the window to justice,” Rozzi said in a news release. “While a constitutional amendment was not my preferred path, it is the best path to move this legislation forward to help adult victims of childhood sexual abuse.”

Rozzi noted that House and Senate leaders “have pledged to get the bill on public referendum as one of the first orders of business in 2021.”

We hope they keep their pledge. We worry they might not.

While the Catholic Conference did not oppose statute of limitation reform for future cases, it’s not likely to drop its opposition to a civil remedy for past victims. And it wields a lot of power in Harrisburg.

A retroactive window, the bishops said in a statement last September, would “inevitably result in bankruptcy for dioceses. Bankruptcy would cripple the ability of a diocese to provide compensation and healing for survivors, while vastly reducing or eliminating social service programs” that serve “some of the most at-risk people in our communities.”

In an editorial, we acknowledged the good work done by Catholic dioceses — but also contended that “these good works don’t mitigate the harm done by bishops who transferred abusive priests to parishes where they could target other children — and then locked the damning evidence in secret archives to which only they had keys.”

Pennsylvania’s Catholic dioceses established victim compensation funds, which provided money for essential counseling for victims, but not the transparency — and church records — that some victims seek.

According to the AP, Rep. Tom Murt, R-Montgomery, argued during floor debate that victims of past abuse should be able to hold accountable institutions that covered up or enabled their abuse. “We need to open the window and allow the light of truth to shine in this dark place,” Murt said. “Anything less is justice denied.”

We agree with him.

We just worry that a referendum to amend the state constitution is too winding a path to justice for victims who already have suffered too much.

The 2018 grand jury report that led the General Assembly to take action — if not with the urgency it demanded — revealed that 301 “predator priests” had abused more than 1,000 children over seven decades. The report also documented the systematic nature in which the horrific abuse was covered up in the Diocese of Harrisburg, which includes the Catholic parishes of Lancaster County, and five other Pennsylvania dioceses.

Ed and Pat Fortney are the Dauphin County parents of five daughters abused by a single priest in the 1980s. “Something like this alters the very fabric of your family and your family’s legacy for years to come,” the Fortneys wrote in a column published in LNP last year. “We have experienced grief at its lowest depth.”

They pleaded for statute of limitations reform that would allow their daughters to seek justice. “Lawmakers are our last hope,” they wrote. “Justice for all victims lies in their hands.”

The Fortneys and others wait for justice still.