BALTIMORE (MD)
WBAL-TV, NBC-11 [Baltimore MD]
February 20, 2025
By David Collins
Law passed in 2023 eliminates statute of limitations; State now facing claims of as much as $3B
Thousands of sex abuse cases could leave Maryland taxpayers responsible for $3 billion in payouts after a 2023 law opened the door to claims.
The Maryland Child Victims Act passed in 2023, eliminating the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse lawsuits.
Now, the way lawmakers are responding to the lawsuits is coming under fire. New legislation under consideration this year would reinstate an even more restrictive statute of limitations, but 11 News Investigates has since learned the bill will be changed.
A child sex abuse survivor, who asked to remain anonymous, is suing the state 43 years after a state detention center employee molested him.
“I still have a trust issue for being molested at a juvenile facility where people were supposed to protect me, but they didn’t protect me,” the survivor told 11 News Investigates.
The survivor said a state employee molested him shortly after he arrived in 1982 at what is now called the Hickey School, a juvenile detention facility.
“He would come behind me, touch me, pull my pants down,” the survivor told 11 News Investigates. “He told me to keep my mouth shut, ‘Don’t tell nobody our business.’ And, I would go home every week.”
The survivor escaped from Hickey but turned to heroin, rather than therapy, to deal with the trauma.
“As time went on, I started sniffing dope more and more, just trying to hide my problems,” the survivor told 11 News Investigates.
He’s not the only one
According to Maryland Department of Legislative Services documents obtained by 11 News Investigates, the survivor’s lawsuit is among an estimated 3,500 filed against the state by child sex-abuse survivors. Some claims are against public schools, most involve juvenile detention centers.
The 2023 law opened the door to lawsuits after it eliminated the statute of limitations on filing a claim. A report by the Maryland attorney general exposing widespread wrongdoing within the Archdiocese of Baltimore is credited for the law’s passage.
The document indicates the state’s liability is capped at $890,000, which adds up to $3.11 billion.
Bill’s statute of limitations language to be stricken
But things have changed now that the state faces billions in liability claims.
Ironically, the lawmaker who spent a decade trying to eliminate the statute of limitations sponsored a new bill to reinstate it. However, Charles County Delegate C.T. Wilson, D-District 28, said legislative leadership and the Moore administration advised him that the new bill was a “vehicle ” to address the claims.
Wilson said he agreed after having read the bill’s title — but he didn’t read the bill, which includes a new, even stricter statute of limitations.
“It would have been very hypocritical,” Wilson told 11 News Investigates. “I would rather walk away with nothing than to go ahead and reinstitute a timeline.”
House Bill 1378 would have provided 90 days to file a claim, but Wilson said that language is being stricken and replaced by an amendment to create a survivors’ fund.
“We are trying to amend it to create something like a pool of money that is going to be in, and possibly create some regulations for limiting legal fees,” Wilson told 11 News Investigates.
How will the state pay for this?
So far, no revenue source has been identified. State lawmakers are already grappling with a projected $3 billion budget deficit.
“I don’t think we will have specific revenue stream for this, and it will probably impact general funds, but it is part of a settlement negotiation, so we don’t know the full scope of what the cost may end up being,” said Senate President Bill Ferguson, D-District 46.
Public records indicate lawmakers ignored warnings in 2023 when the bill eliminating the statute of limitations was under consideration.
“Your language in the bill that seems to indicate it is a single occurrence, so multiple incidents could be $850,000,” Bill Crest, with the Maryland Association of Boards of Education, said during testimony in February 2023 before the Maryland Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee.
Changes to the bill are expected to be made during a hearing on Feb. 27. WBAL-TV 11 News Investigates reached out to Gov. Wes Moore’s office and Democratic leadership in the General Assembly for comment and will update this report with their responses.
Attorney: 2023 law is a deterrent to abuse
Attorney Jonathan Schochor, who is involved in four separate venues of child sex-abuse claims, told 11 News Investigates that he’s hopeful state lawmakers do not reinstate a time limit to file a lawsuit. He said he believes the current law is a deterrent to abuse.
“Punishing people financially is a way to incentivize them to stop these practices, and that’s our goal,” Schochor told 11 News Investigates.
“There is no money or settlement that will solve that problem of what happened to me as a kid, and so, probably, the rest of my life, I have to live with that,” the child sex-abuse survivor who spoke with 11 News Investigates said.
The survivor said he’s now clean and sober but still struggling to move forward.