Wyoming Legislature to Consider Giving Sex Abuse Victims More Time to File Lawsuits

By Seth Klamann
Wyoming Tribune Eagle
December 19, 2019

https://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/crime-and-courts/wyoming-legislature-to-consider-giving-sex-abuse-victims-more-time/article_c0c7037c-44b9-5120-8d05-43044ba5fbd0.html

The completed golden dome atop the Wyoming State Capitol Building is pictured in Cheyenne on June 5.

Mirroring a move made in several other states, the Wyoming Legislature will consider extending the statute of limitations for lawsuits filed by the victims of child sexual abuse.

The current statute states that a civil action must be brought by the time the victim is 26 or within three years of the "discovery" of the abuse. The proposal, which has support from the Joint Judiciary Committee, would extend that to the victim's 53rd birthday. The legislation is somewhat modeled after a recent law passed in Utah, which retroactively opened the statute of limitations for past victims and removed it altogether for any cases of abuse in the coming years.

Wyoming already has no statute of limitations on the criminal prosecution for those accused of sexual abuse.

Sen. Tara Nethercott, a Cheyenne attorney and the Republican chairwoman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said that concern about the state's statute of limitations was brought to her committee earlier this year. Lawmakers studied it, directed legislative staffers to draft a bill and then voted to support it in November.

Nethercott said the committee wasn't looking at any particular case or scandal -- like renewed investigations into sexual abuse by Catholic priests -- when it was drafting and considering the bill.

"The committee has been learning about child abuse, child sex abuse, and human trafficking," the senator said. "It dovetailed into the overarching topics that the committee was addressing."

Similar laws have been enacted or are being considered across the country. Montana's governor signed a law in May that removes the statute of limitations for criminal prosecutions and extends it for lawsuits. New York's legislature passed a one-year window for past victims to file lawsuits, an effort opposed initially by the Catholic Church. California, New Jersey, Pennsylvania all have passed bills clearing the way for victims who were abused decades ago to file lawsuits against their abusers and the organizations who employed -- and, frequently, protected -- them.

Pennsylvania has been the epicenter of renewed scrutiny into abuse in the Catholic Church. Last year, a grand jury there found that more than 300 priests had abused more than 1,000 children going back decades. Similar efforts have been undertaken elsewhere across the country, including by the Attorney General's Office in Colorado.

Wyoming's Catholic Church released its own list of 11 priests who served here and who faced substantiated allegations of sexual abuse. The list includes more than 30 victims -- all but one of them victimized as children -- of the 11 men.

Nethercott said the bill "has its challenges," but she said that "at a minimum, it will spark a healthy debate about the topic and the necessity to review the issue."

In public testimony in front of the Judiciary Committee in November, the Wyoming Trial Lawyers Association and victims advocates told lawmakers they supported the bill. Supporters noted the "imprint" that trauma leaves on victims and how it may take years before a person is able to process what happened and relay it to others.