BishopAccountability.org
	Problem Priests: As Time Goes by St. Louis Post-Dispatch September 11, 2005 THE MISSOURI SUPREME COURT faces difficult questions about when, if ever, to shut the courthouse door on decades-old allegations of sexual abuse by priests. Last week, the Missouri Supreme Court heard Michael Powel's lawyer argue that he should be able to move ahead with a civil suit against Chaminade and two former priests, in which Powel alleges sexual abuse more than 30 years ago. Mr. Powel argues that the statute of limitations should not start ticking at the time of the alleged abuse because he repressed memories of the abuse. Instead, he argues that the legal clock should start in 2000 when brain surgery uncovered his memories. Meanwhile, former priest Thomas Graham faces 20 years in prison after a jury found him guilty of sodomizing a boy in the Old Cathedral some time between 1975 and 1978. He was convicted under an anachronistic 1969 sodomy law that provided no statute of limitations for "abominable and detestable crimes against nature." David Clohessy, director of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, says that juries ought to be able to hear the evidence in cases of this kind and sort out the truth. Denying victims the opportunity to press their cases in court only deepens the victim's feeling of helplessness, he said, which can lead to addiction and even suicide. Mr. Clohessy also argues that criminal sexual abuse of a child is the type of crime that shouldn't have a statute of limitations. Like murder, another crime without a time limit, the victim often is voiceless and unable to help prosecutors. Advertisement On the other hand, there are good reasons for statutes of limitations. Those accused of wrongdoing years or even decades after the fact have a tough time proving their innocence. Evidence disappears. Memories fade and shift. People can repress - and recover - terrible memories. But experts say that recovered memories often are unreliable. The Missouri Supreme Court already has had to throw out the conviction of one former priest, James Beine, because of the vague wording of the law used against him. The sodomy law's language of "abominable and detestable" open to the same kind of criticism. So what does justice require? A priest who abused a child three decades ago deserves to be punished. But the courts must make sure that zeal to punish problem priests does not undermine the basic rules of fairness that protect even those accused of the most heinous acts.