Sauder Schelkopf announces the signing of California Assembly Bill 218 by Governor Gavin Newsom which will allow California victims of childhood sexual abuse to file cases starting January 1, 2020.

As reported by the Los Angeles Times on Oct. 13, 2019:

California grants more time for filing child sexual abuse allegations under new law

Victims of childhood sexual abuse will have more time to report allegations and file a lawsuit under a California law signed Sunday by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

The legislation was introduced following widespread allegations of abuse of minors by Catholic priests as well as the 2018 conviction of Larry Nassar, a former U.S. Olympic gymnastics team doctor, for molesting young athletes.

“The idea that someone who is assaulted as a child can actually run out of time to report that abuse is outrageous,” said Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez (D-San Diego), the bill’s author. “More and more, we’re hearing about people who were victims years ago but were not ready to come forward to tell their story until now.”

Currently, survivors must file a lawsuit within eight years of reaching adulthood or within three years of the date a survivor who has reached adulthood “discovers or reasonably should have discovered” they suffered damages, whichever comes later.

Gonzalez’s Assembly Bill 218 extends the statute of limitations for reporting childhood sexual assault from the time a victim is age 26 to age 40, and increases the period for delayed reasonable discovery from three to five years.

The bill also provides a window of three years for the revival of past claims that might have expired due to the statute of limitations. In addition, damages can be trebled in cases in which a child becomes a victim of sexual assault as the result of an effort to cover up past assaults, Gonzalez said.

Experience Matters

Sauder Schelkopf has a nationally recognized sexual misconduct litigation practice.  Our former prosecutors have extensive experience representing victims of all ages.  Sauder Schelkopf, and co-counsel, recently reached a $215 million settlement on behalf of female patients of Dr. George Tyndall, a gynecologist at the University of Southern California accused of sexual misconduct since the 1990s.  We currently represent survivors of clergy sexual abuse in dioceses throughout the country.  We have a class action lawsuit pending on behalf of males who were victims of sexual misconduct by Dr. Richard Strauss, the Ohio State team doctor, while they were students and student-athletes at Ohio State University.

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If you are a survivor of sexual misconduct, you can confidentially contact the lawyers at Sauder Schelkopf by filling out the form on this page or calling 888.711.9975