In 2023, Maryland lawmakers passed a bill to open the courthouse doors to many survivors of childhood sexual abuse. The law, known as the Child Victims Act, eliminated the statute of limitations for civil lawsuits for sexual abuse claims. To provide a mechanism for survivors whose claims had already expired under the old statute of limitations, the act also opened a “revival window” for survivors to bring claims that were previously time-barred.
But now, Maryland’s own government is arguing that some survivors cannot walk through those doors after all. In a case currently before the Supreme Court of Maryland, the state is arguing that a legal doctrine known as sovereign immunity bars many claims against state institutions even though the Child Victims Act revived those claims against private defendants.
In other words, if the state prevails in this case, a survivor abused by a priest or a private school teacher may still be able to sue the institution that enabled the abuse. But a survivor abused by a public school teacher, correctional officer, or other state employee could lose that same opportunity simply because the institution responsible was the government.
Sovereign immunity, which is rooted in English common law, generally means that governments cannot be sued without their consent. Some legislatures have waived immunity for broad categories of claims, but courts generally determine how narrowly or broadly to interpret those waivers. The result is a patchwork in which a survivor’s ability to hold institutions responsible can depend as much on the particulars of state immunity law as on the facts of the abuse itself.
Maryland did not consent to be sued in tort until 1982, when the Maryland Tort Claims Act allowed people to bring legal claims arising from the conduct of state employees. Now, in State of Maryland v. J.C., the state argues that the Child Victims Act only revived claims that had expired under the previous requirement that victims bring claims before their 38th birthday. But, Maryland says, the Child Victims Act did not retroactively waive immunity for conduct that occurred before the Tort Claims Act was passed.
If accepted by the Supreme Court of Maryland, this argument would limit the reach of the Child Victims Act for reasons that have nothing to do with the seriousness of the abuse or the responsibility of the institution. A survivor abused in, say, 1983 in a public institution and a survivor abused in 1973 in a private institution could bring claims under the Child Victims Act. A survivor abused in a public institution in 1981 would still be locked out of court.
Maryland’s argument reflects a broader problem in the way the American legal system treats survivors of sexual abuse. Lawmakers (in Maryland and elsewhere) create revival windows because trauma, power imbalances, and institutional secrecy often prevent survivors from disclosing childhood sexual abuse until decades later, after ordinary statutes of limitations have expired. Without these reforms, survivors may never have the opportunity to hold either individual perpetrators or the institutions that enabled abuse responsible.
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Institutional liability plays a particularly important role because abuse often involves failures beyond the actions of one person. Lawsuits against organizations that negligently supervised employees or ignored warnings can reveal what leaders knew, how they responded, and whether their failures allowed abuse to continue. They can also provide survivors with a realistic source of financial compensation, since institutions are more likely than individual perpetrators to have the resources necessary to satisfy judgments and settlements.
As Maryland’s argument shows, though, survivors may face additional barriers before a court ever considers whether public institutions failed in their obligations. In many states, immunity rules, damages limitations, and procedural requirements create different systems of accountability depending on the employer of the person who caused the harm.
Pennsylvania offers an example of an extreme version of this divide. The state’s sovereign immunity law permits lawsuits against public entities and employees only in very narrow circumstances authorized by statute. Because those exceptions do not include intentional torts such as sexual assault, survivors abused by state employees may have no ability to sue the government entity responsible for their abuse.
Even when lawmakers attempt to remove those barriers, public defendants can receive protections unavailable to private institutions. Rhode Island recently expanded its revival window for childhood sexual abuse claims, but the law preserves special damages limitations for governmental defendants: A survivor abused by a public employee is limited to $100,000 in damages, regardless of the severity or duration of the abuse.
New York demonstrates another form of unequal treatment. The state has waived sovereign immunity for sexual assault claims and opened revival windows for survivors regardless of age. But survivors who sue under the Adult Survivors Act regarding abuse perpetrated by correctional officers encounter procedural barriers that do not apply to ordinary civil defendants: Lawsuits against the state must proceed through the Court of Claims, where plaintiffs must provide detailed information about the time, place, and circumstances of abuse before discovery can reveal the records that might establish those facts.
In New York, this burden falls especially hard on survivors of abuse in institutional settings, where perpetrators often held power over victims and where disclosure may have occurred decades after the harm. In one recent case, the state successfully argued that even typos in a filing prevented a survivor’s lawsuit from moving forward—and it has sought dismissal of hundreds of similar claims on the same grounds.
Revival windows were designed to address the fact that ordinary civil rules do not account for the realities of sexual abuse. Survivors may need decades to disclose abuse, identify institutional failures, and gather evidence.
But those reforms cannot fulfill their purpose if public institutions receive protections that prevent survivors from ever reaching the merits of their claims. Public institutions should face the same standards of responsibility when they fail to protect children, or ignore warning signs, or allow abuse to continue. Survivors deserve equal access to the courts, regardless of who employed the person who harmed them.
