“We could never have anticipated the sheer volume of cases”
This is the very embodiment of corruption in the most evil kind of way.
Maryland lawmakers passed a measure Saturday to try to limit future liabilities from claims of sexual abuse at state and private institutions after thousands of people unexpectedly came forward with allegations of abuse, many of them in youth detention centers, putting potentially billions of dollars at stake for the state.
The wave of cases targeting the state’s juvenile justice system resulted after Maryland eliminated the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse claims two years ago with the Catholic Church abuse scandal in mind.
In 2023, Maryland passed the Child Victims Act that was signed into law by Gov. Wes Moore lifting the time limit on how long people could wait to sue over alleged child sexual abuse by institutions.
“The passage of time will not prevent survivors from seeking justice for sexual abuse they suffered as children. I am proud of the role our office played in defending this landmark statute,” Attorney General Anthony Brown promised earlier this year
Now Maryland is rushing to gut the Child Victims Act because it’s not just the Catholic Church getting sued.
How long did it take Maryland Dems to rush the bill through shielding themselves? Two days.
The rapid-fire passage of House Bill 1378 — it got out of the House, through the Senate, back to the House and to the governor’s desk in just two days…
Two days. That’s how corrupt everyone involved in this.
C.T. Wilson, who introduced the Child Victims Act bill, then introduced a bill gutting the bill because the bill was getting too high.
The measure, which now goes to Gov. Wes Moore, reduces caps on settlements from $890,000 to $400,000 for cases filed after May 31 for state institutions and from $1.5 million to $700,000 for private institutions.
Note that the cap for government institutions is $400,000, but at $700,000 for private ones. Why is that?
A number of Democrats who voted for the bill in committee said it was a tough decision, but expressed concerns about the potential costs to the state.
Del. David Moon (D-Montgomery) said the state “does not have the option of bankruptcy to run from our obligations the way our private counterparts do.” Moon voted to move the bill out of committee “with great regret … and apologies to the victims.”
If Maryland is expecting to go bankrupt over all those lawsuits, that either raises questions about the level of abuse by the state… or the credibility of the lawsuits.
The State should not be above the law. And that’s what Maryland Democrats are doing here.
Maryland state Sen. Will Smith, who chairs the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, said it has been estimated that Maryland is facing a potential liability between $3 billion and $4 billion.
Smith, a Democrat, noted that lawmakers approved the 2023 Child Victims Act in response “to a long fight to have justice for victims of child sex abuse, where our prior framework barred some of those claims if you were above the age of 38.”
“But what we could never have anticipated was just the sheer volume of cases that ensued,” Smith said.
We would never have done this if we knew just how badly we were going to get sued.
“This is the most knowingly unconstitutional piece of legislation this legislative body has ever passed,” said Corey Stern, an attorney representing child sexual abuse survivors, in a text after Saturday’s full Senate vote. “The members who voted for it should be ashamed of themselves. The leadership that insisted they do should be voted out of office.”
If they were capable of shame, none of this would have happened in the first place.
Article posted with permission from Daniel Greenfield
