Hudson Valley 360
By Kate Lisa
June 14, 2021
Activists lamented state lawmakers’ decision to potentially conclude session for the year early Friday morning without passing a handful of measures to impact survivors of sexual abuse, state health care and more.
Survivors and representatives with Safe Horizon, a nonprofit victim services agency, condemned Assembly leaders and lawmakers Friday for failing to advance the Adult Survivors Act before session’s end, or even bring the measure up for a vote.
The bill, which unanimously passed the Senate on June 3, would give New Yorkers who suffered sexual abuse over the age of 18 one year to file civil lawsuits for past trauma and hold abusers accountable, even if statutes of limitations on those legal claims have expired.
“By failing to pass the Adult Survivors Act, the Assembly is telling survivors that we do not matter,” said Marissa Hoechstetter, one of more than 200 survivors of sexual abuse by ex-Columbia gynecologist Dr.Robert Hadden.
“The Assembly’s failure to even bring this widely supported bill to a vote where it surely would have passed also lets us know that they are OK with institutions enabling sexual violence. Their inaction negates their previous good work to extend statutes and take other protective measures. “In order to stop serial sexual abuse, we need a public reckoning for those institutions that fraudulently conceal violence and protect predators. No matter their age, each victim deserves to be heard.”
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Brad Hoylman and Assemblywoman Linda B. Rosenthal, both D-Manhattan,
died in the Assembly’s Judiciary Committee.
Assembly leaders have not returned requests for comment on the conference’s position on, or reason for,
stalling the bill, which is modeled after the Child Victims Act. The Child Victims Act gave child sexual abuse survivors a vehicle to file civil lawsuits against their abusers for incidents that happened before age 18.
Childhood sex-abuse survivor Gary Greenberg, who was a leading advocate in securing the Child Victims
Act’s passage, has been in communication with Assembly leaders, and said he believes the Assembly stalled the Adult Survivors Act to examine and amend issues with the measure.
Dozens of survivors of childhood sexual abuse have struggled to secure an attorney to take their case,
especially if a victim’s abuser lacks financial wealth or other assets, or was not abused by an institution.
“Lawyers will not take cases where there is not a wealthy abuser or rich institution — we applaud the
Assembly for taking the time to do its due diligence on the Adult Survivors Act,” Greenberg said. “We look forward to working with all parties to amend the Child Victims Act and pass an Adult Survivors Act that will allow all victims to obtain justice.
“We must see a victim’s fund, pro-bono work for lawyers and a percentage of lawyers’ winnings going to the fund.” Greenberg thanked Speaker Carl Heastie, D-Bronx, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Lavine, D–Glen Cove, for not bringing the bill to the floor for a vote with flaws intact.
But the majority of survivors argue legal hurdles challenging a handful of victims should not prevent action that will bring thousands justice.
“The Assembly’s failure to pass the Adult Survivors Act sends the message to survivors that they are not seen, heard or respected,” Safe Horizon CEO Liz Roberts said in a statement Friday. “The New York State legislature has committed a painful injustice against survivors, proving that laws which favor abusers take precedence over having their wrongdoing recognized and tried in the court of law. We will continue to fight for the rights of survivors until the justice system does exactly that.”
More than 6,000 New Yorkers have filed civil cases under the Child Victims Act since August 2019. The Child Victims Act lookback window ends Aug. 14.