MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe
March 20, 2012|Kevin Cullen, Globe Columnist
If timing is everything, Kathy Picard’s was lousy.
She was 32 years old when she accused a relative of sexually abusing her when she was a girl. Police in Western Massachusetts told her the 15-year statute of limitations that kicked in when she turned 16 had expired the year before.
Picard threw herself into the campaign to remove the statute of limitations. In 2006, after prosecutors complained that they couldn’t make cases against Catholic priests who had abused minors years before, the Massachusetts Legislature voted to extend the statute of limitations to 27 years after a victim turns 16. It was a compromise, but an improvement.
When the new law kicked in, Picard was 44, again one year too late to seek charges.
“It’s arbitrary and wrong,’’ she says. “When it comes to abusing kids, there shouldn’t be any statute of limitations.’’
More than 100 of 160 House members have already endorsed House Bill 469, which would eliminate the statute of limitations for the sexual abuse of minors and make it impossible for predators to escape prosecution and accountability by hiding behind the calendar.
Whether they get a chance to vote on this is another question. On Beacon Hill, pure power often trumps pure democracy. The House chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Representative Eugene O’Flaherty, says he opposes the bill but insists that’s not why it won’t be reported out this week on time. There’s just a backlog, he says
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