MARYLAND
Associated Baptist Press
By Bob Allen
Maryland’s highest court of appeal declined Sept. 22 to review what has been described as largest evangelical sex-abuse case to date, leaving intact lower-court decisions dismissing the class-action lawsuit on legal technicalities.
The Court of Appeals, the highest tribunal in Maryland, declined without comment to review a June 26 decision by the Court of Special Appeals dismissing Doe v. Sovereign Grace Ministries.
The lawsuit, originally filed in October 2012 in Montgomery County, Md., alleged a culture of enabling and covering up pedophilia in churches associated with Sovereign Grace Ministries, a Calvinistic church-planting network based in Louisville, Ky.
Special Court of Appeals Judge Deborah Eyler ruled that a group of alleged abuse victims and their families did not follow proper procedure in filing their appeal of an earlier dismissal in circuit court, and therefore her appellate court could not legally consider their argument.
In May 2013, Montgomery County Circuit Judge Sharon Burrell ruled that plaintiffs had missed a window of opportunity to sue for sexual abuse damages within three years of turning 18.
In their appeal, the plaintiffs said they were suing not over the abuse, per se, but alleged collusion by church leaders that didn’t come to light until 2011.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.