Albany, NY – The lawyers faced the Superior Court of New York on Wednesday on how specific that a man alleges sexual abuse decades must be in his lawsuit against the State in a case that is being observed by defenders concerned with the legal standards for survivors Remember traumatic events.
The Office of the Attorney General Letitia James is looking for the dismissal of the lawsuit by a man who says he was sexually attacked repeatedly around a state theater in Albany from 1986 to 1990, starting when he was 12 years old. The lawsuit was filed under a state law of 2019 that allows people to sue for the sexual abuse they suffered a long time ago as children.
A state prosecutor told the Court of Appeals that the lawsuit does not properly specify the nature of the abuse claimed and that his period of time for when the alleged abuse occurred is too broad, and is not standards to sue the State.
The case only deals with requirements to sue New York, not in private institutions.
“It doesn’t necessarily need to be a specific date, but it should be a very narrow range,” said Jeffrey Lang, from the Attorney General’s office. “I would say weeks, and here we just have nothing.”
Narder time frames are needed so that the State can investigate claims and evaluate its responsibility, Lang said.
James’s appeal has worried some supporters of the Child Victims LawThe state law that temporarily raised the barriers to present civil demands on child sexual abuse beyond the typical time limits. They say that victims of child abuse can be expected to constantly remember the details of the trauma that occurred a long time ago.
The man’s lawyer echoed the argument on Wednesday.
“At the time this claim was filed almost four years ago, this was the scope of the information I knew due to psychological trauma,” said lawyer Seth Dymond.
The man sued the State in 2021, saying that he was repeatedly violated, abused and stroked multiple men, including state employees, around the egg, a theater of performing arts in the State Capitol complex. Associated Press generally does not name the people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they are publicly presented.
The claim was originally dismissed by a judge of the claims court that cited the lack of specific dates. A middle level appeals court reversed that decision in November 2023. The appeals judges found that since the alleged events occurred several decades ago when the claimant was a child, the period of several years was specific enough.
The case is between approximately 300 presented against the State for a two -year window under the law of victims of children. The participation of the lion of more than 10,800 demands filed before the window closed in 2021 with names private institutions such as churches, hospitals and schools.
The arguments about the demand of man have highlighted the tensions between the public image of James as champion for the victims and their legal duty to defend the State against the demands.
A spokesman for the Democratic Attorney General said in a prepared statement that the survivors of child sexual abuse “deserve the opportunity to seek justice through the process described in the law of children’s victims. As a lawyer in New York, we have the responsibility of defending the State , that we are balancing with our strong desire to support survivors and their ability to heal. “
James argues that the Legislature could have adopted different legal requirements to sue the State when preparing the law.
The defenders and lawyers of the survivors have expressed concern that a victory for the State could affect some pending cases presented under the law of children’s victims, as well as the cases bought more recently under a complementary law that opened a litigation window for The people who said they were abused as adults. . The Adult Survivors Law resulted in more than 1,400 lawsuits against the State, the majority alleges abuse in state prisons.
“The State basically says: ‘We do not believe the victims. We are not going to allow these victims to have their day in court, “said Gary Greenberg, a defender who fought for the law of children’s victims.
The professor of the Faculty of Law of Albany, Dale Margolin Cecka, said that James’s main duty is to defend the State. By appealing before the Superior Court, James seeks a resolution on the standards to sue under the law of victims of children who are not clear, said Cecka, who represents victims of domestic violence.
“She can’t go, ‘Well, this seems so bad that we are not going to personally advocate our client’, which is the state of New York,” Cecka said.
By
