Survivors and anti-abuse advocates testify against “child victims act” with no retroactive look-back window
Current legislation would fail to hold perpetrators and the institutions that enabled them accountable
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: FEBRUARY 22, 2024
CONTACT:
Tim Law
ECA Co-founder/Board Member
+1-206-412-0165
timalaw@aol.com
Mary Dispenza
SNAP Northwest Director
+1-425-941-6001
mcdispenza@comcast.net
At this afternoon’s hearing before the Washington State Senate Ways and Means Committee, clergy abuse survivors and advocates of the Catholic Accountability Project (CAP) testified against HB 1618, legislation that would abolish the civil statute of limitations for child sex abuse victims without providing a look-back window that would allow victims previously barred from filing claims to bring lawsuits.
Child sexual abuse is one of the most underreported crimes in the country, and CAP commends the legislature for proposing to eliminate the statute of limitations that currently keeps thousands of Washington State survivors from pursuing justice through the courts. The average age at which a child sex abuse victim reports their abuse is 52. With a civil statute of limitations of just three years, the vast majority of victims have been unable to file lawsuits. HB 1618, would change this for any child who is raped or sexually assaulted after June 6th, 2024. However, without a lookback window that allows every child sexual abuse victim a chance to bring their civil case before a court, this legislation does not eliminate the barriers to justice for victims.
The Washington State legislature has demonstrated robust support for the elimination of the civil statute of limitations on the principle that every child victim deserves justice regardless of when they are ready to file a case in civil court. By denying victims this right by failing to include a look-back window in HB 1618, the legislature is punishing victims and exonerating perpetrators and their institutions based on budgetary speculation provided by the Office of the Attorney General regarding the number of cases that could be filed against state agencies.
According to Child USA, including retroactive look-back windows “has not resulted in an avalanche of cases or false claims.” As of December 2023, Child USA asserts that “no state that enacted a window has had a case that involved false claims in the courts.”
Last week, CAP publicly announced that subpoenas were sent from Attorney General Ferguson’s office to Washington State’s three Catholic dioceses seeking documents related to clergy sexual abuse and its institutional concealment. Neither the Attorney General Ferguson, nor Archbishop Étienne who spoke to victims last week, have confirmed whether the Catholic Church has cooperated with the subpoenas.
CAP members had a conversation with Archbishop Étienne on Wednesday afternoon about the AG subpoenas and a recent case of a priest removed from a Renton parish.
With no information about the results of an investigation into the clergy abuse and cover-up detailed in these tens of thousands of pages of documents and evidence, the Washington State legislature must not deny clergy abuse victims the right to bring civil suits against their perpetrators and Church officials who enabled them.
“The Church has known for many, many decades of the scourge of clergy sexual abuse of our children and the cover-up by its bishops…and yet they have the privilege to be protected by a bill that will not hold them accountable for past sexual abuse of children,” said Tim Law, Seattle-based attorney and CAP Founding Member. Peter Isely, a clergy abuse survivor and member of CAP said, “All abuse is in the past. Abuse happening today will be in the past tomorrow...This bill must be retroactive or it eliminates our abuse and suffering because it didn’t happen after this June. It erases us.”
See video of CAP Member testimonies starting at 1:31:55
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