BishopAccountability.org
	Defend Children or the Church? By Marci Hamilton Detroit Free Press April 28, 2010 http://www.freep.com/article/20100428/OPINION05/100427072/1322/Defend-children-or-the-church As revelations of childhood sexual abuse by clergy have become epidemic across the globe, the Vatican has instituted a number of measures to increase transparency and action in dealing with the crisis. The pope has now met with victims, accepted the resignation of a number of bishops, and issued a directive on how to properly report abuse to civil authorities. These steps are welcome and necessary, but, with all due respect, they don't mean much to the countless victims of priest sex abuse who have yet to experience anything approaching justice. Survivors of these heinous crimes, including far too many in Michigan, have suffered for years in ignominy and silence. They will continue to do so unless Michigan joins the growing movement of states across the country that are introducing and enacting laws to reform their statutes of limitation for childhood sexual abuse. Survivors typically need decades to come forward, and the legal system offers the only viable means of identifying child predators who are operating under the radar. In fact, there are two statute-of-limitations reforms that must be passed in order to level the playing field for victims. First, civil and criminal statutes of limitations need to be liberally extended or totally eliminated, as Alaska, Maine and Delaware have done. Second, the courthouse doors need to be opened for victims even if their statutes of limitations have expired. By creating a "window" – a set time period for victims to initiate legal proceedings against their perpetrators – states would also perform an essential public service by exposing the names and crucial information about these abusers. California and Delaware have embraced such reform, and others, including Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, New York and Wisconsin, are considering it. In California, the public learned the identities of 300 child predators. To their tremendous credit, Michigan legislators are considering a bill, HB 5699, which would, at once, extend the statute of limitations to 30 years past the age of maturity (18) and create a two-year window starting on the date of enactment. Under current Michigan law, victims have only until age 19 to file civil claims against their perpetrators and those who fostered abuse. If bishops in Michigan were actually interested in true transparency, they would back this bill rather than vehemently opposing it. Indeed, while a hearing is scheduled on the legislation today, a substitute bill – which would extend the statute of limitations by a ridiculously short five-year period, while dispensing of the window component – may displace it. The bishops' fingerprints are all over this substitute. A quick perusal of the Michigan Catholic Conference's Web site repeats the same misleading arguments posed by bishops in other states against this kind of reform. First, the MCC argues that "statutes of limitations exist because it is impossible to defend decades old claims." On the contrary, changing the statute of limitations does no more than change the timeframe when a victim may file suit. The initial burden of proof remains on the victim, who must still provide evidence of the abuse or the case will be dismissed and no defense will need to be mounted. Moreover, in many of the cases against the Catholic Church, not to mention other entities like the Boy Scouts, there are secret archives that often contain all the evidence needed to prove the abuse and cover-up. Without statute-of-limitations reform, those archives remain locked up. The MCC also claims: "The bill does nothing to protect Michigan's children." Yet, as California proved, it is the only tried and true vehicle that guarantees the public will learn the identities of numerous child sex abusers. For this reason alone, every parent in the state should be demanding passage of HB 5699. Sex offender registries, pedophile-free zoning, and longer sentences assume that predators are already known. Further, the MCC asserts: "This bill … targets religious institutions and nonprofit organizations but does not address public schools and other governmental institutions." In fact, HB 5699 applies to all private entities, not just religious or nonprofits. And while it is correct that the bill does not extend to public entities, they are almost always regulated separately in every state. Michigan should enact the legislation and then turn to the issues of sovereign immunity in the public school context, just as Delaware did. Finally, the MCC, after urging parishioners to call their state representatives to oppose the bill, makes the typical, but provably false, claim that it "poses grave danger to Michigan Catholic parishes and schools, and would 'hurt the helpers' by diverting critical resources away from the charitable mission of Catholic institutions." In fact, statute-of-limitations reform, including the window component, has not led to cuts in services. In California, settlements in cases were paid out of insurance proceeds and from the sale of non-religious property owned by the dioceses, such as office buildings, hotels and empty lots. And Catholic Charities receives the bulk of its funding, over 60%, from local, state and federal tax proceeds. Michigan legislators have a choice: Do they defer to the MCC and the bishops, or do they protect the children of their state?
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