NEW YORK
New York Daily News
BY
MARCI HAMILTON
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Thursday, June 15, 2017
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is currently holding its annual General Assembly in Indianapolis, where no doubt church leaders are discussing politics as much as doctrine.
As they continue to run from their clergy sex abuse scandal, furiously trying to push it into the past, they cannot be happy with the release of Netflix’s “The Keepers,” the extraordinary docuseries about the death of a nun who blew the whistle on horrendous sex abuse in a Catholic high school.
Nor can they ignore the ardent momentum for the passage of New York’s Child Victims Act. It would have been law long ago but for the bishops’ lobbying against it with their alternative facts on how such laws operate.
Until now, New York has been among the worst states for justice for child sex abuse victims. Bills have been introduced to reform the statutes of limitations for these most heinous of crimes no less than a dozen consecutive years in the Assembly, only to die a painful death in the Senate each time as the bishops with their insurance-carrier lobbyists exult.
Indeed, they invest millions and concoct arguments to scare lawmakers away from doing what is right for the unjustifiably exiled victims. They tell lawmakers that statute-of-limitation reform will clog the courts with a mountain of cases and reputations will be sullied by false claims. They especially fight a “window,” which provides the only justice available for victims from the past.
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