A Prince George’s County Circuit Court judge ruled a class action lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Washington can proceed Wednesday, dismissing a challenge brought by the church to the Maryland law underpinning the case.
Attorneys for the archdiocese filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit on the grounds the state’s Child Victims Act – a 2023 law that allows child abuse survivors to file civil claims regardless of when the abuse happened – is unconstitutional. In court Wednesday, the attorneys argued the Archdiocese is protected from civil lawsuits because of a 2017 Maryland law they say granted them “vested rights” to be free from liability as non-perpetrator defendants.
But attorneys for the three men who brought the class action lawsuit say the Maryland legislature was within its right to amend earlier laws when it passed the Child Victims Act last year.
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In their filing, the men – whose names are not disclosed -- describe the alleged abuse they endured as children by priests and people employed by the archdiocese. The News4 I-Team previously interviewed one of the men, identified in court filings under the alias “Richard Roe,” who said he was assaulted by an unnamed priest at St. Jerome Parish in Hyattsville in the 1960s. In the complaint, Roe alleges that around age 10, he was lured to the priest's bedroom and molested.
“I couldn't tell nobody. My mother was a devout Catholic. Who was she going to believe? Who was anybody going to believe?” Roe told the I-Team last December.
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On Wednesday, Prince George’s County Associate Judge Robin D. Gill Bright sided with the plaintiffs. Attorneys for the archdiocese declined comment with News4, but in a statement, a spokeswoman for the archdiocese said the church intends to appeal the decision. Several said they expect the Maryland Supreme Court will ultimately hear the challenge to the law.
Attorney Jonathan Schochor, who represents the plaintiffs, hailed Wednesday’s ruling as a victory for survivors state-wide.
“It’s a great day for survivors of sexual abuse in Maryland, because they’ve been waiting decades” to bring such claims, he said.
Several survivors who spent years pushing for the enactment of the Child Victims Act attended Wednesday’s hearing, including Teresa Lancaster and Jean Hargadon Wehner, who have blamed the Archdiocese of Baltimore for abuse they say they endured as children in its schools.
The Baltimore archdiocese filed for bankruptcy just days before the Child Victims Act took effect last October.
Lancaster said the latest challenge to the law was “frustrating” and “exhausting.”
Hargadon Wehner noted the point was to bring relief to survivors who may not be ready to face their abuse – or their abusers – until later in life.
“As a survivor who started remembering years after the abuse … I can attest to how long it took for me to be able to talk about it, to bring it to anyone. There should be no statute of limitations for this crime,” she said.
In a statement, a spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Washington said: “The important constitutional principles presented in this case are not unique to The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington and are at issue in the cases filed against public entities, private schools, and secular and religious organizations across the state.”
The statement continued that, regardless of the outcome of its pending appeal, the Archdiocese of Washington remains committed to its "longstanding efforts to bring healing to survivors through pastoral care and other forms of assistance that are available apart from the legal process."
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