Keith Hoffmann’s Statement on the Attorney General’s Diocese Report

There is no doubt that survivors of child sexual abuse deserve every opportunity to seek justice. That's why I testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week: to ensure that any institution that covered up the sexual abuse of children will be held accountable.

As Attorney General I will fight to ensure survivors have their day in court, and if necessary my Office will be ready to successfully defend the amended statute of limitations for these claims before the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

Seeking an advisory opinion on the constitutionality of this legislation is the wrong thing to do for many reasons. And the idea that an advisory opinion will save survivors from the trauma of having to unnecessarily testify to their abuse is not based in fact.

The Rhode Island Supreme Court - which will likely not even rule on a request for an advisory opinion

- will have the opportunity to review the constitutionality of the law on appeal before any trial that would require victims to publicly testify about the heinous criminality of the sexual predators who abused them and the powerful institutions that covered it up.

The only action guaranteed to needlessly re-traumatize the victims of child sexual abuse would be to make them testify yet again in support of this bill in the coming years. That is exactly what will happen if the Senate seeks an advisory opinion now.

Moreover, the legal opinions of AG Neronha and his staff - together with that of highly-respected former U.S. District Judge William Smith and other legal experts — are without question sufficient to allow members of the General Assembly to confidently proceed here to a vote on the bill, as they have with countless other bills where an interest group raises the red herring of a constitutional concern as political cover for a policy with which it disagrees.

We live in a period of great distrust of government and institutions spurred by revelations of very real abuses of power and corruption. There is only one way to regain the public's trust: complete transparency and full accountability.

I join with the survivors of the sexual abuse covered up by the Diocese of Providence, as painstakingly documented in AG Neronha's recent report detailing the misery of hundreds of victims and decades of revolting misconduct by those charged with their care, and thank the Senate Judiciary Committee for their careful consideration of this urgent matter.

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