3 States, 3 Bills on Child Sex Abuse - Legislation Improving Somewhat

Maryland Governor signs bill to help

child sex abuse victims

by John Rydell

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (WBFF) - Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has signed into law a bill which increases the age victims of child sexual abuse can file civil suits against their abusers.

Current law limits such lawsuits to age 25, but the bill signed by the governor would increase the age to age 38.

This is a big improvement and I congratulate Delegate Wilson and Governor Hogan. I would have preferred that there be no age limit at all, but 38 is certainly much better than 25.

Del. C.T. Wilson, a Democrat who represents Charles County, is calling the signing of the bill a victory for victims of child sexual abuse. 

Three years ago, Wilson disclosed to his legislative colleagues that he was a victim of child sexual abuse. Wilson says: "I want folks to know they're not alone; there are a lot of victims out there. It takes a long time to come to grips with what you're going through. I'm still going through it, and just because the abuse stops, doesn't mean the damage does."

Wilson attended Tuesday's bill signing ceremony at the Maryland State House, where he was hugged by Hogan, who said: "I want to thank Delegate C.T. Wilson for his incredible leadership on this bill."

Wilson says he will not financially benefit from the legislation but he hopes the new law will help other victims. Wilson says: "Most folks don't come to grips with what they've gone through by age 25. Sometimes it takes having children of your own to realize what you've been through and you don't want anyone else to go through it."

Amendments to Penn state sex-abuse bill could kill it

Changes would allow victims to pursue limitless damages

By Karen Langley and Maria Panaritis / Harrisburg Bureau

HARRISBURG — In a move that could doom the measure, a key state House committee Tuesday broadened a child sex abuse bill to allow victims who sue to pursue potentially limitless damages from private and governmental institutions, including school districts.

Under the amended bill, which sparked some debate among members, government entities would lose elements of sovereign immunity, exposing them to large liability awards. It is attached to a new version of a controversial bill that died last year amid battles waged by victim advocates, the Catholic Church and the insurance lobby.

Tuesday’s vote to lift caps on the amount of money sex abuse litigants can collect in lawsuits against governmental entities was viewed by some supporters of expanding child sex abuse victims’ rights as a “poison pill.”

That is because in at least one other state, Colorado, legislation to expose government institutions to lawsuits unleashed the opposition of the school boards association, and failed. Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, then archbishop in Denver, was key in defeating that effort.

Material health means nothing for a Church,

unless it sets the stage for something more important:

renewing the heart and spirit.

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

The issue of capping public civil payouts was not part of last year’s legislative fight in Harrisburg. That bill died over a different provision that sought to let adult victims of decades-old abuse sue private institutions. That provision is expected to be added to the House bill in the weeks ahead.

The amendment by the committee Tuesday removes much of the shield that last year’s legislation put in place for public entities.

Last year’s legislation would have allowed lawsuits only in the event of “gross negligence.” The bill amended by the House on Tuesday is a Senate bill approved earlier this year to expand the rights of victims to sue. The Senate bill reduced the threshold for suing public entities to just negligence.

That, combined with the House committee’s decision to lift liability limits, significantly exposes institutions that had more protection under last year’s bill.

“The intent of this amendment is to make a level playing field,” said Rep. Joseph Petrarca, D-Westmoreland, who sponsored the cap amendment. “What we’re trying to do is stop this behavior of what’s going on with sexual predators.”

But Rep. Rick Saccone, R-Elizabeth Township, said the removal of stronger sovereign immunity protections, and of the caps on damages, would be unfair to taxpayers.

“I think we should concentrate on going after the perpetrators and make them as accountable as humanly possible,” he said. “The highest offense, the most egregious act that someone could commit, is these types of things, and I think they should be held personally accountable, not the taxpayer.”

The bill, which passed the committee by a 22-5 vote, is expected to reach the House floor later this month. Victim advocates will fight for language allowing adult victims the right to sue for what happened to them decades ago.

The bill approved by the committee retained Senate language to eliminate the criminal statute of limitations for future cases of child sex abuse. But it did not accept the Senate bill’s total elimination of the civil statute. The Senate bill would have placed no time limit on when future victims could sue their attackers or other individuals for child abuse they suffered.

Instead, the House committee chaired by Ron Marsico, R-Dauphin, changed the bill to give future victims up to age 50 to file such lawsuits. Currently, victims have only until age 30 to do so.

A year ago, the House overwhelmingly passed a child sex-abuse bill that contained retroactive rights for people up to age 50 to sue. Its 180-15 vote came at the height of a clergy abuse scandal in the Catholic Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown.

But that controversial provision was removed from the legislation in the Senate, after an intense push by advocates for the church and the insurance industry, who questioned its constitutionality and said it could unfairly punish struggling congregations.

Nebraska child sex abuse lawsuit bill wins initial approval

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A bill that would lift the statute of limitations for child abuse sex victims to sue perpetrators has won first-round approval in the Nebraska Legislature.

Lawmakers advanced the measure Wednesday with a 29-3 vote.

Sen. Bob Krist of Omaha says ending the statute of limitations is important because child sex abuse victims sometimes repress their memories or feel too ashamed to talk about what they experienced until later in life.

A statute of limitations would remain in place for people who were abused before the bill goes into effect if their claims were previously time barred. Victims would have to file lawsuits within 35 years after their 18th birthday or three years after the date when the bill goes into effect, whichever is longer.

As with the Maryland bill, this is a big improvement over the status quo, but, here, leaves victims of historical child sex abuse completely out in the cold. There needs to be a window of opportunity for all victims to sue their abusers.

Life After Child Sex Abuse Difficult, but You Can Survive and Even Thrive

By RILEY JOHNSON | LINCOLN JOURNAL STAR

Susan Napolitano plays with her dog Rosebud. The Lincoln lawyer was
sexually abused as a child and says it's possible to survive and thrive.

Life for thousands of Nebraska children who are sexually abused almost certainly will include struggles, but counselors, psychologists and survivors say there is hope.

“You’re not doomed,” said Lincoln lawyer Susan Napolitano, who was raped by a relative in Michigan in the 1980s.

“It’s not what you see in the movies. I don’t shoot up. I don’t cower. I don’t feel like it has dominated my life path.”

It's possible to process and heal, she said.

“It’s going to be another brick in your foundation,” she said.

Napolitano remembers summer nights in the Upper Peninsula when she popped the screen off her bedroom window and contemplated jumping.

“(I’d) think about leaving and try to work up the courage to just jump out the window and just go and tell somebody,” she said. “But I didn’t trust that that would work.”

Like an estimated 90 percent of child sexual abuse victims, Napolitano knew her perpetrator.

When she was 8 or 9, she said, he started to make her fondle him.

“Don’t tell,” he told her.

Every kid needs to learn about sex, he said. He'd be her teacher.

She felt something was wrong, but he convinced her not to tell anyone.

The abuse escalated -- ultimately to sexual intercourse, she said.

“I remember telling him that it hurt, and he wouldn’t stop,” Napolitano said. “And that’s when I knew that this guy was not who I thought he was.”

Candy and gifts followed the assaults, coupled with apologies and promises it would stop.

But the promises were empty, she said.

Napolitano kept the abuse secret until she was 11, when she wrote a note and left it out for an adult to find, she said.

The abuse continued for about four years, until he left, she said.

Courtesy photo
Susan Napolitano at 8 or 9, dressed as Raggedy Ann for a school play. This was about the time the abuse started. 

Long-term effects of child sexual abuse vary, but many victims have post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, substance abuse issues and anxiety, said University of Nebraska-Lincoln psychologist David Hansen.

One study found children who are raped are about 12 times more likely to attempt suicide than non-victims.

While researchers believe there's strong evidence a significant number of victims have psychological and behavioral issues, some studies suggest as many as 50 percent of them present no symptoms.

Sexually abused children also tend to exhibit problematic sexual behavior, researchers have found. And they are more likely to continue to engage in inappropriate sexual behavior after an adult tells them to stop -- some into adulthood.

Although there's often concern children who are sexually abused will grow up to be sex offenders themselves, Hansen said there's no causal link.

There is a causal link, just not where you are looking. It is spiritual not biological or psychological.

In fact, researchers estimate victims of child sexual abuse are two to three times more likely to be sexually victimized as adults than people who were not abused as children.

Still, Lincoln psychologist Steve Blum said he saw a common trend at the Lincoln Regional Center, where he evaluated more than 1,000 sex offenders over 15 years as a consultant for the center.

About a third of those offenders reported being sexually abused as children, he said.

That might be higher than was actually the case, Blum said, but in several instances the offender’s abuse of a child mirrored his or her own.

One man arranged his daughter’s room to replicate the room in which he was abused as a child, he said.

When the daughter turned the age he was when he was abused, he molested her, Blum said. At some less-than-conscious level, he said, the man was acting out his own molestation.

Why that happens isn’t clear, he said, but one thought is that the victim was powerless when he or she was abused, and by abusing, is taking back that power -- albeit in a very disturbing and unhealthy manner.

Because of that feeling of powerlessness, it's crucial how adults respond when a victim discloses abuse, Blum said.

“If there isn’t a supportive, protective response, the trauma that the victim experiences is much greater.”

Layne Armstrong stands with his
Teammates mentor,
David Kolowski

Layne Armstrong didn’t think police would believe him when he decided to tell them what former Project Youth Director Joe Ballard did to him.

But as he watched the ball drop on TV on New Year's Eve 2009, he thought of another year passing and the potential of more boys being abused by Ballard, who also coached youth basketball.

Armstrong was 19 then, and routinely abused meth to mask the pain of being abused by Ballard for six years, starting when he was 11.

Ballard gained his mom's trust, he said, spending time with him that included overnights at Ballard's home. Eventually, he said, Ballard raped him.

He said he tried to drive Ballard away by having the letters KKK tattooed just below his biceps. It didn’t work.

But Armstrong was homeless by then and using drugs. When he needed a place to stay, he said, he'd go back to Ballard's.

On that New Year’s Eve years later, Armstrong called a former Teammates mentor and opened up about the abuse for the first time.

Then he went to police, who strapped a wire to his chest and sent him to Ballard’s apartment, recording a conversation about a sexual encounter between the two.

More victims came forward, and in October 2010, a judge sent Ballard to prison.

He turned 48 on Friday, and is serving 34 to 50 years at the state prison in Tecumseh. He'll be eligible for parole in 2027.

“It takes just one person to save a life,” Armstrong said. “It takes just one person to save 100 lives.

“I was that one person.”

Now 25, Armstrong is married with two kids. He owns a roofing company, and he's sober. He had the KKK tattoos covered with crosses.

“I made my dreams come true,” Armstrong said. “I fought for them.”

But he's not immune to the past. In August, he was drinking with friends and ended up in the parking lot where Project Youth used to be.

Being there brought it all back, he said. Enraged, he punched the car and broke his hand.

He quit drinking after that, and he's learned to deal with the flashbacks through counseling, he said.

“You’re always going to be a victim until you’re tired of being a victim,” he said. “I’m not a victim anymore."


Bianca is 26 and tried for most of her life to bury the memories of what happened when she was 10.

Her older brother sexually abused her for about six months in their home in rural Nebraska, she said.

“Since it was someone in my family, I felt like I couldn’t tell.”

She distracted herself with school, the drive to excel helping her feel good about herself.

But it also instilled a fear of failure. In fifth grade, when the abuse was happening, she got lesions on her skin, among other physical side-effects, Bianca said.

After that, memories of the abuse surfaced now and then, but she’d jettison them from her mind, she said.

Only when she saw a counselor for an unrelated matter during her freshman year in college did she disclose what happened, she said.

Anxiety and depression stemming from the abuse continued, hitting hardest in 2012. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been happy.

She enrolled in a therapy group for child sexual abuse survivors called Wounded Heart and run by counselor Deb Perrin since 2011.

The faith-based program is based on a book of the same name by counselor Dan Allender, who believes that abuse changes the victim's soul.

Perrin said counseling survivors of child sex abuse is her life's calling, drawn out of her own abuse.

She said she was molested and sexually abused by a relative from when she was 3 until her pre-teen years. Until her abuser died when Perrin was an adult, she said, she wasn't sure she was sexually abused because she was so young when it happened.

But in cleaning out the relative's home, she found items that triggered her memory.

She got into counseling in 1984 and ultimately started the local Wounded Heart group.

"You feel more like supported because you’ve been in such isolation in your head,” Perrin said. "And it’s a shameful secret that you don’t want people to know about you."

Through the 42-week program, she said, the survivors dive into the trauma through group and individual therapy.

Bianca said that hearing other women's experiences helped.

"It just kind of made you feel less alone and more normal," she said.

Bianca's mother eventually guessed the source of the depression her daughter was battling, and the secret came out, she said.

For all her life, she felt she had to protect her parents from knowing what happened because she knew they would burden themselves with guilt.

They know now, and family dynamics are strained, she said. Her brother feels ashamed, and they're not a cohesive unit anymore.

Bianca has struggled with trust issues and believes the powerlessness she felt during the abuse reared its head when she became intimate with a man as an adult.

Despite that, she doesn't wish her brother ill, she said.

“At some point, I would like to have a conversation with my brother, telling him that I love him and forgive him. That I never want our relationship to be destroyed.”

The hope for victims of child sexual abuse lies in processing the pain head-on, Bianca said.

“Even though it’s hard, it’s so much richer and more meaningful,” she said. “I feel like I’m seeing the power of God in ways I never would have.”


Susan Napolitano remembers a turning point in her teenage years.

She drank, smoked pot and hung out with older boys. Her self-esteem was low, and the abuse hadn't stopped. One night, her parents grounded her after she sneaked in late.

She swallowed half a bottle of aspirin and went to sleep, she said. Instead of dying, she awoke wired, her heartbeat audible in her ears.

"Just get through this s***, and you're gonna make it," she thought to herself. "This is your trial."

She took refuge in art and English, feeling empowered by teachers who she felt saw the good in her, she said.

"If I did not paint and write and color, I don't think that my mind and heart would have been able to gain the peace to move forward."

In college, Napolitano went through counseling, confronted her abuser in a letter and made peace with the trauma, she said. She took her case to authorities in the 1990s, but Michigan's statute of limitations had run out.

Stupid Michigan!

So she moved forward, became a teacher and later fulfilled a childhood dream by becoming a lawyer. She opted to pursue a career in real estate law instead of locking up criminals, she said. She didn't want her abuse to define her career, she said.

Her life isn't perfect, and trust will probably never come easy.

But the mother of three is not ashamed of what happened to her, and she doesn't want others to ignore what happened to them or be afraid to speak up.

"You discover your character," she said. "You find out who the hell you are."

Child Sex Abuser Gets Incredible Break After Lawyer's Mishandling of Evidence

By: Lena Tillett
WOWT News

A Sarpy County, Nebraska man convicted and sentenced to at least 15 years in prison for sexually assaulting two children, received a new sentence Tuesday after a retrial, and it does not include more jail time.

Deputy Sarpy County Attorney Jennifer Jessig told WOWT 6 News, Philip Armstrong, 73, pled to two felony counts of intentional child abuse. Each count carries a maximum sentence of up to five years, one per victim. Armstrong was sentenced immediately to four to five years on each count to run concurrent. However, because Armstrong has already served time for the initial conviction in 2009, he will not face more jail time.

Why concurrent sentences? Why? They are so stupid!

Armstrong was initially sentenced to 15 to 30 years in 2009. After an appeal, the Nebraska Supreme Court ruled his attorney, Steve Delaney, made major errors in the case and that it might have affected the outcome of the trial.

According to the mistrial ruling, the major error was how video evidence was used. Delaney showed Armstrong a recording of the victims' interview with investigators and Armstrong then showed the video to members of his family. The family members were initially going to be witnesses for the defense, but after seeing the video they were not allowed to testify.

Seriously, Delaney gave Armstrong a copy of the victims' interview? Is the Nebraska bar looking into Delaney's conduct? He should not go unpunished for such a careless act.

The mother of the victims sent WOWT 6 News reporter Lena Tillett the following statement:

"In 2008, Project Harmony did everything they promised to maintain the privacy and safety of my children. For this I am deeply grateful. Everyone that came in contact with my children, treated them with the greatest amount of respect.

Mr. Steve Delaney, Mr. Philip Armstrong and the members of his family were the ones who mishandled the video evidence in this hearing, that ultimately resulted in Mr. Armstrong winning his appeal. Although no felony charges were ever filed against Delaney or the members of the Armstrong family, they tampered with evidence.

It is my hope, that this will NEVER happen again to another victim. It is my hope that this will not hinder victims from coming forward in crime cases like this. This was a unique situation where one incompetent lawyer, and a family that was desperate to find some way to dispute my girls' testimonies resulted in the failure of the judicial system.

Although Mr. Armstrong will not be on the sex offender registry, we know what he did. He knows what he did. Our neighbors know what he did. His family knows what he did. It is he who will have to carry this guilt with him forever. As for my girls, they are strong, beautiful and intelligent young women who will not allow Mr. Armstrong's actions define them."

And, so, why is he not on the sex offender registry when he admitted two felony counts of intentional child abuse? I don't get it.

Sarpy County, Nebraska