BishopAccountability.org
	Clergy Abuse Victims Deserve Day in Court The Republican [Massachusetts] March 26, 2006 http://www.masslive.com/editorials/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1143276052275690.xml&coll=1 Hundreds of sexual predators live in Massachusetts, free from prosecution for their crimes because the law protects them. Their names do not appear on a list of sexual offenders; they are not required to report to the local police department when they move from one community to another; they are not required to wear electronic devices so authorities can monitor their whereabouts. Under Massachusetts law, the police can't touch them. So change the law. Advocates for victims of clergy sexual abuse urged state lawmakers at a hearing earlier this month to approve bills that would abolish the statute of limitations in criminal and civil cases involving sexual abuse of children. Under current law, sexual crimes against children that took place 15 or more years ago cannot be prosecuted. Therapists, psychologists and victim advocates testified that it often can be decades before victims find the courage to report the abuse to authorities. Former Springfield bishop Thomas L. Dupre is the highest Catholic prelate in the nation to be indicted on child rape assault charges, but Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett cannot prosecute him because the charges are too old. Dupre's lawyer, Michael O. Jennings, defended the decision shortly after Bennett told reporters in 2004 that he would not proceed, "Memories dim, witnesses disappear, evidence is lost, motives change. The more time that passes, the more unfair it is to make someone face allegations," Jennings said. No victim of sexual assault should be denied an opportunity to face his abuser in court because time ran out. Church leaders in the Springfield diocese knew of abuse by priests in the diocese, failed to report it to legal authorities and allowed it to continue. After 15 years, however, it was no longer the church that protected the abusers, but the commonwealth of Massachusetts. Peter C. Pollard, 54, of Hatfield, the Western Massachusetts coordinator for the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, told legislators that he was sexually abused by a priest in the 1960s when he was an altar boy in Marblehead. He urged legislators to eliminate the statute of limitations. "It would give people the opportunity to come forward and hold people accountable for the harm they caused, and to start healing," he said. Lawmakers should stop protecting sexual predators.
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