NY GOP, Pressured By Religious Groups, Won’t Pass Bill To Help Sex Abuse Victims
June 22, 2017 by Hemant Mehta

Right now in New York, victims of childhood sexual abuse have until the age of 23 to sue their assailants. The proposed Child Victims Act would allow survivors to “bring civil cases up until their 50th birthdays and felony criminal cases until their 28th birthdays.”

This seems like a no-brainer. After all, there shouldn’t be a statute of limitations against child molesters. Sometimes it takes a while before victims are mentally and emotionally ready to face their assaulters in court. Prying open that tiny window would allow more of them to seek justice.

Who the hell would oppose such a sensible measure?

The Catholic Church. Yeshivas. The Boy Scouts (which is also a religious group). The Catholic League’s Bill Donohue. And, of course, Republicans.

As State Sen. Brad Hoylman points out in the piece, those religious institutions oppose the bill because “they think it’s gonna bankrupt them.”

Bee’s response?

Quote:

I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that if you’re an institution that has hurt so many children that paying out civil settlements would make you go bankrupt, maybe you should.