Maryland sexual abuse lawsuit investigation

The archdiocese wants to have time limitations returned to child civil sexual abuse lawsuits in Maryland.

Were the people who sexually abused you or a loved one shielded by an organization in Maryland? You can still join a class action lawsuit, but the Catholic Church is attempting to overturn a recent law that abolished the statute of limitations in these cases.

Two days after filing for bankruptcy, the Archdiocese of Washington, which includes the District of Columbia and the five surrounding Maryland counties of St. Mary’s, Charles, Calvert, Prince George’s and Montgomery counties, took its fight against child civil sexual abuse lawsuits to a new level.

For now, you can still join a class action lawsuit against the church or any other organization that shielded sexual abusers, whenever it occurred.

However, the Archdiocese of Washington is trying to overturn Maryland’s Child Victims Act, which allows the victims to sue with no time limits. The law went into effect Oct. 1.

A challenge by the church

The church is challenging the law in defending itself against lawsuits already filed. The archdiocese maintains that the new law violates Maryland’s constitutional provisions for due process because it is hearing cases that were already denied because of existing deadlines.

Maryland Attorney General Anthony G. Brown vowed to defend the law.

New law, new protections

The Child Victims Act passed by an overwhelming 175-5 vote in the Maryland General Assembly and was made official when a report was released detailing sexual abuse by more than 150 clergy members going back to the 1940s. It overturned existing Maryland law that cut off cases when the alleged victim was 38.

According to The Washington Post, shortly after the new law went into effect multiple lawsuits were filed against other institutions, including the state’s juvenile detention facilities.

Many institutions have been accused of shielding sexual abuse by people in power, trusted by parents and children because of the organizations they represented, including:

• Southern Baptist
• United Methodist
• Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon church)
• Jehovah’s Witness
• Church of Scientology

Should the cases against the church be dismissed on the grounds of unconstitutionality, complaints against all other organizations in Maryland would be affected.

It was long argued that memories of alleged victims could not be trusted over time. As the cases multiplied and the real scope of the alleged abuse became clearer, Democrats and Republicans agreed that the age restriction should be abolished.

“There is no statute of limitations on the hurt that endures for decades after someone is assaulted,” Gov. Wes Moore said, according to The Associated Press. “There is no statute of limitations on the trauma that harms so many still to this day, and this law reflects that exact truth.”

Maryland attorney general’s report

Within an hour of the law passing, Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown released findings of an investigation into the Archdiocese of Baltimore. He told PBS that investigators reviewed hundreds of thousands of documents relating to the abuse of some 600 survivors from cases that dated back to the 1940s. Some of the investigations involved children recovering in hospitals.

“And what we saw and we tried to detail in the report was pervasive abuse by priests, seminarians, deacons and other employees of the archdiocese and this intentional effort by the Catholic Church hierarchy to conceal this abuse,” Brown said. “There was physical abuse and mental abuse. There was sexual abuse and rape. And this occurred between the abusers, who had positions of power and authority, and some of the most vulnerable people in our society, children, children who are devoted to the Catholic Church, and yet were abused over and over again by the very people who are entrusted to care for these children.”