An adult survivor of sexual abuse as a child has filed a lawsuit against a former youth group leader for the Tabernacle Baptist Church in upstate New York.

A woman from Tompkins County filed a lawsuit against the Ithaca-area church and David W. Smith, who led a teen church program called Word of Life Group more than 40 years ago. The lawsuit was filed Dec. 20 in Tompkins County Supreme Court under the provisions of the state’s Child Victims Act.

The Ithaca Journal reports court documents allege the woman was 13 years and Smith was 31 years old when the sexual abuse started in 1975.

Smith and his wife allegedly cared for the girl when her parents were on out-of-town trips. The girl also stayed overnight at the Smith’s home whenever the youth group’s teachings ran late into the evening. Smith purportedly went into the room of his house where the young girl was staying and forced her to commit sexual acts both there and in the basement of his home, according to court documents.

The Ithaca Journal says the lawsuit alleges church leaders were told of the child sexual abuse, but none of them ever held Smith accountable.

Adult Survivor of Sexual Abuse Turns to Child Victims Act

Since the Child Victims Act went into effect in August 2019, more than 1,330 lawsuits have been filed against alleged abusers and the institutions that helped cover up the abuse.

The Child Victims Act extended the time for victims to file criminal charges from the victim’s age of 23 to now the age of 28 years old and extended the age limit from 23 to now 55 years old to file a civil complaint. In addition, the law offers a one-year look-back window for survivors to file civil lawsuits against their former abusers and the institutions that allowed the abuse to continue, even if the original statute of limitations had run out.

Now, according to the Albany Times Union, New York State Sen. Brad Hoylman wants to provide an adult survivor of sexual abuse committed when they were a child with an additional year to file claims. Hoylman was one of the original sponsors of the Child Victims Act and introduced a bill on Jan. 3, 2020 that would extend the one-year window.

“Other states, including California and New Jersey, have instituted multi-year revival windows for civil lawsuits because it can take decades for adult survivors of child sexual abuse to come forward,” said Hoylman said in a statement. “To ensure the maximum number of survivors have time to seek justice and further protect the public, New York should extend the Child Victims Act’s revival window for another year before it expires in August.”

Some advocates believe there are victims who want to see how the current cases proceed before filing their own. Others worry that in situations that don’t involve a large entity such as the Roman Catholic Church or the Boy Scouts of America as potential defendants that victims might have a difficult time finding a lawyer to take their cases.

If New York’s look-back window is extended, it wouldn’t be the first to allow victims longer than a year to file old claims. New Jersey has a two-year look-back window that began on Dec. 1, 2019.

Effective Jan. 1, 2020, California’s version of the Child Victims Act opened a three-year look-back window, and North Carolina’s law opened a two-year look-back window.

This article is not legal advice. It is presented
for informational purposes only.