Although a deadline has passed in a priest abuse case, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court will consider an appeal that would allow the case to move forward, as reported by the Bangor Daily News.
The victim, C.S.A., has filed a lawsuit alleging sexual abuse that occurred at the hands of former Catholic priest, R.C.H., when he was assigned to Bangor's St. John Catholic Church in the 1970s.
Oral arguments are due to be heard at the Cumberland County courthouse on September 13.
C.S.A. sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland in March 2010 in the Cumberland County Superior Court. She alleged that R.C.H. abused her from 1970 to 1973 and that the diocese, through the attorneys that represent them, denied the abuse allegations.
A Superior Court justice granted the diocese's motion - coupled with one from R.C.H.'s attorney - to disallow discovery to move forward as the deadline for C.S.A. to file had already passed.
Legislature passed in 2000 removed the statute of limitations in civil cases that involved sexual abuse. The legislature, however, was not retroactive.
C.S.A.'s Augusta-based attorney, Keith Varner, argued in a brief to the state Supreme Court that the case was barred from the statute of limitations. R.C.H.'s attorney, Portland-based Peter DeTroy, argued that Maine law required that the suit be filed by November 1985.
Mid-November of 1985 signifies when it would have been six years after C.S.A. had reached the age of 18.
Varner claimed that DeTroy's argument failed to take into account that R.C.H. had left Maine - he had moved to Massachusetts. The statute did not start running again until R.C.H. moved back to Maine.
Varner wrote in his brief, "The language of (the statute) at issue here is plain: 'If a person is absent from and resides out of the state, after a cause of action has accrued against him, the time of his absence from the state shall not be taken as a part of the time limited for the commencement of the action."
DeTroy argued that as his client was never hiding, in moving from Maine to Massachusetts, therefore the statute of limitations should not be considered suspended. DeTroy wrote, "The record of this case is devoid of any fact or circumstance that may suggest - even remotely - that (R.C.H.) was not (amenable) to personal service of process by the Maine courts.
Indeed, with the same ease that (C.S.A.) identified (R.C.H.) current residence and served him with process in 2010, she presumable could have served him before the limitations period ran out without any more effort that it took to locate and serve him now."
Sue Bernard, the diocese spokeswoman, said that R.C.H. left the Catholic ministry in 1977. He began to petition the Vatican for laicization in 1978, and was finally granted his request in 2009.
Bernard has stated that the diocese did not know of the abuse allegations against R.C.H. until 2009 and resolved the claim in April 2010. The only defendant in the current lawsuit is R.C.H.
If a member of the clergy has abused you, even if it was several decades ago, you need to contact a personal injury lawyer. The diocese, along with the priest, is subject to liability.