FLORIDA
Courthouse News Service
TAMPA (CN) – A former teacher must face decades-old sexual abuse allegations, but negligence claims against a school and church are time-barred, a federal judge ruled.
Ronald Weil, a Miami-based attorney who represents John Doe, applauded the court’s decision to allow Doe’s vicarious liability claim to stand.
“We are very pleased that the federal court has recognized the right of abuse victims who suffer from repressed memory to bring claims against employers, keeping with Florida Supreme Court precedent,” Weil said in an interview. “It is the first time the federal court has the opportunity to rule on this issue, and in that sense it is a landmark.”
Weil’s client attended St. John’s Episcopal Parish Day School, in the Episcopal Diocese of Southwest Florida, in the 1970s. In a federal complaint filed this past September, Doe alleged he suffered sexual and physical abuse at the hands of two former teachers, Jon Caridad and James Biggers, while he was an altar boy, congregant and student between 1971 and 1975.
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