PENNSYLVANIA
Reading Eagle
By Liam Migdail-Smith
As Pennsylvania’s new top law officer sees it, giving childhood sexual abuse victims a chance to sue, regardless of when the abuse occurred, could encourage more victims to come forward.
Attorney General Bruce Beemer told the Reading Eagle on Thursday that he believes there’s a solid case to be made that legislation to that effect would be constitutional. Advocates for child sex abuse victims have sought changes in state law to allow victims to file lawsuits even in cases where the statutes of limitation have expired.
Beemer said legal minds could disagree and the matter is unsettled, as state courts have not weighed in.
But he said, “I think it’s important to law enforcement to be able to stand up for victims to be able to air their complaints and have a forum in which they can be heard.”
Beemer’s take counters that of former Solicitor General Bruce L. Castor Jr., who told a state Senate panel in June that allowing victims to file lawsuits when the deadline to do so has passed would violate the state Constitution.
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