Statute of Limitations on Child Sex Abuse: 'It Routinely Takes the Victims Decades to Come Forward'

The Morning Call
July 10, 2012

www.mcall.com/opinion/mc---yes---point-counterpoint-child-abuse-statute-20120710,0,5241553.story

John Salvesen, executive director of the Foundation to Abolish Child Abuse, Bryn Mawr, Montgomery County.

John Salvesen, executive director of the Foundation to Abolish Child Abuse, Bryn Mawr, Montgomery County.

Q: What is different about the crime of child sex abuse that requires a longer statute of limitations in civil cases and no statute of limitations in criminal cases?

A: It routinely takes the victims decades to come forward if they come forward at all. That's the nature of the reaction to child sexual trauma. It takes time. A statute of limitations that limits the age by which a victim must come forward almost, by definition, excludes virtually all victims.

Q: Doesn't waiting a long time to report a crime weaken a case?

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A: These changes to the statutes don't do anything but give victims of child sexual abuse a chance to have their case heard in court. If too much is forgotten, you're going to lose your case. This only lets you in the door.

In many cases, you're not relying on the memories of eyewitnesses other than the victim. There is almost never an eyewitness — it's not like assault with a deadly weapon. The fact that there was a witness in the Sandusky case is one in a million. That never happens.

If there's no evidence, or if it's too old or too stale, there will be no conviction. All this does is guarantee that it actually goes to court. In the case of the Roman Catholic Church, there is a lot of evidence other than memories. They're called personnel files.

Q: How can lengthening the statute of limitations prevent other crimes?

A: What makes this worse is that we're seeing, in some cases, that institutions are not doing enough to stop it. In this Penn State case, as we watch it unfold, we're seeing that the institution had all this evidence and did nothing. Had there not been a statute of limitations, could this have been brought to light earlier? We need the tools to uncover this crime.

Q: How do you respond to critics who argue that increasing the statute of limitations to 50 years in civil cases will bring frivolous lawsuits?

A: This might be the world's smallest problem. Go to Lexis-Nexis and search how many fake accusations are made up about child abuse. You'll find maybe one or two. Even if you believe it to be a real problem, you can account for it with some type of certification.

Sometimes these laws include some sort of precertification by a third party — that the plaintiff actually suffered some sort of injury and it is not something made up.