The Massachusetts attorney general’s office said this week that it could not bring criminal charges over the clergy sexual abuse it documented in a years-long investigation, because the statute of limitations had expired for particular crimes or the conduct was not a crime under state law when it occurred.
Attorney General Andrea Campbell released the findings on Wednesday, covering the Roman Catholic dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester. The investigation found that more than 270 clerics abused nearly 1,000 children and that diocesan leaders failed for decades to act.
Much of the misconduct the office uncovered predated 2002, when, after reporting in The Boston Globe on clergy sexual abuse, the state criminalized reckless endangerment of children and made priests and other clergy mandated reporters of child abuse.
Lawmakers have lengthened the deadlines repeatedly since. In 2006 they eliminated the criminal statute of limitations for most child sexual abuse felonies and for reckless endangerment, with one condition: charges filed more than 27 years after the crime must be supported by “independent evidence that corroborates the allegation,” according to Ms. Campbell’s office. DNA analysis establishing the offender’s identity can supply it.
But her team “cannot apply a criminal law retroactively,” Ms. Campbell said, so even reckless endangerment committed before 2000 still cannot be prosecuted under the 2006 change. Some of the offending clergy identified in the report are also dead.
Survivors face their own clock. Under state law they must file any civil suit within 35 years of the abuse, or within seven years of learning that it caused “an emotional or psychological injury or condition,” whichever comes later. For children the 35-year count begins at 18, so a lawsuit must be filed before the victim turns 53.
Twenty other states and Washington, D.C., had eliminated the civil statute of limitations for some or all child sexual abuse claims as of last November, according to Enough Abuse, a Boston advocacy group.
Ms. Campbell said Wednesday that “the ultimate responsibility for accountability, in many instances, rests with diocese leadership.” She called on the three dioceses to better report and investigate their offending members, and asked the Diocese of Worcester to publicize “credibly accused” clergy, as other Massachusetts dioceses have done. “Massachusetts law continues to create significant barriers,” she said, saying many victims in the report waited “decades” to come forward.
Ms. Campbell, 44, also disclosed publicly for the first time that she is a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. “Behind every one of those numbers is a child whose safety was violated,” she said. “A family that was changed forever, and a survivor who carried the trauma of that abuse for years and, in many cases, decades.”
On Beacon Hill, with Ms. Campbell’s support, State Representative John Lawn, a Watertown Democrat, has filed an amendment to eliminate the civil statute of limitations entirely. It is caught up in closed-door negotiations over a primary health care bill. Ms. Campbell is also backing an “indefinite lookback period” that would let survivors file suits the deadline had already cut off. The Legislature last widened the window in 2014, giving victims an additional 32 years to sue; the previous age limit was 21.
“There’s an urgency” this year, Mr. Lawn said. “This has been going on for an awful long time, and a lot of powerful institutions have been trying to block it ... but I think these institutions should be held accountable for harming children.”