If you were sexually abused as a child in New York, the law gives you far more time to bring a civil claim than it once did, and a New York Child Victims Act lawyer can explain what is still available to you without any pressure to decide anything today. Many survivors reach out decades later. That is normal, and it is exactly the situation this law was written for.
Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower handles these cases with care and confidentiality. The first conversation is a conversation, not an intake interview, and you control how much you say and when. Below are the questions survivors ask our Child Victims Act attorneys most.
Call us at (212) 732-4992 24/7 to arrange to speak with a personal injury lawyer about your case, or contact us through our website today.
The Child Victims Act is a New York law that gives survivors of childhood sexual abuse much more time to seek accountability than the old rules allowed. Under those older rules, most people lost the right to bring a claim before they were old enough to understand what had happened to them, let alone talk about it.
The law also recognized something survivors already knew: that abuse in a school, a church, a camp, or a youth program is rarely only about one person. It is usually also about an institution that had warning signs and did not act.
Often, yes. A survivor of childhood sexual abuse in New York can generally bring a civil claim until age 55, which means most people who were abused as children still have time.
The separate two year window that briefly revived older, expired claims has closed, and a similar one year window for people abused as adults has closed as well. That is why the age based rule matters so much now, and why it is worth having someone confirm where you stand rather than assuming your time has run out. That review is free and confidential.
No. You can call and ask general questions without giving details, without naming anyone, and without committing to anything. Many first conversations are about what the process would look like rather than about what happened.
Survivors often carry a fear that they will not be believed, that they waited too long, or that they do not remember enough to matter. None of those things ends a case. Our Child Victims Act lawyers move at the pace you set, and part of the job is making sure you are not asked to relive more than the case actually requires.
A claim can be brought against the person who committed the abuse, and against an institution that allowed it to happen. In practice the institutional claim is often the more meaningful one, because institutions had the ability to prevent what happened and usually have the resources to be accountable for it.
That includes schools and school districts, religious organizations and their parishes and dioceses, youth programs, camps, sports leagues and clubs, scouting organizations, foster care agencies and group homes, daycares, hospitals and treatment programs, and the employers of people who had access to children through their work.
Institutions are not automatically responsible simply because abuse occurred on their property. Cases are built on what the organization knew, what it should have known, and what it did.
The proof usually comes from records the institution has and the survivor has never seen. Personnel files, prior complaints from other families, internal investigations and their findings, transfers and reassignments of the same person from one location to another, hiring and background check practices, supervision policies, mandated reporting failures, and correspondence about earlier concerns. When the same name appears in earlier complaints, that record often carries the case.
The law is not limited to any one setting. Claims arise from abuse by teachers, coaches, clergy, camp counselors, scout leaders, tutors, medical providers, group home and foster care staff, program volunteers, and family acquaintances. Abuse by a school employee is covered on our teacher sexual abuse page.
It also does not matter that the abuse happened off site, on a trip, at a home, or during an activity that was not officially sanctioned, if the access came through the institution's role in the child's life.
Claims against public institutions are usually harder to bring because of short notice deadlines that apply to government agencies. The Child Victims Act removed that barrier for these claims. A survivor does not have to have filed a notice of claim within ninety days of the abuse, which would have been impossible for a child, and public schools, districts, and public agencies can be held accountable under the same age based rule.
This is one of the most important things the law changed, and many survivors of abuse in public schools do not know it.
No. A civil claim does not depend on whether the abuse was ever reported to police, whether anyone was arrested, or whether a criminal case was brought or succeeded. Criminal and civil cases have different rules and different standards of proof, and most Child Victims Act claims proceed with no criminal case at all.
Not reporting at the time is not held against a survivor. It is the ordinary response of a child, and it is well understood in these cases.
A claim may still be possible. Where an institution is responsible for what happened, the death of the individual does not end the case against that organization, and the institution's records often remain. Many survivors come forward only after learning that the person died or that others have come forward, and those cases proceed.
Privacy matters enormously in these cases, and it is protected in several ways. Courts frequently permit survivors to file using initials or a pseudonym rather than their full name. Records containing sensitive information can be restricted, and settlements often include confidentiality terms.
Your conversation with a lawyer is confidential from the first call, whether or not you decide to go forward. You also decide who in your life knows, and when. Our Child Victims Act lawyers will tell you honestly what can and cannot be kept private, including what a claim may require if it goes to trial, so nothing about that is a surprise later.
It is slower and less dramatic than people expect. It begins with a conversation and a review of what you remember and what records exist. If a claim is brought, the institution responds, and the case moves into an exchange of documents where the organization's own files are obtained.
At some point a survivor is usually asked to give testimony, in a conference room rather than a courtroom, with your lawyer beside you and with accommodations that courts routinely allow. Most of these cases resolve without a trial. Throughout, you can stop and ask questions, and you are entitled to understand every step before it happens.
Money does not undo what happened, and no survivor should be told otherwise. What a claim can do is pay for the care and the consequences:
For many survivors, the record itself matters as much as the recovery, because it establishes what the organization knew and did.
No. Our Child Victims Act lawyers handle these cases on a contingency fee basis, which means there is no fee unless there is a recovery. The first conversation is free and confidential, and it does not obligate you to file anything.
Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower listens first. Our Child Victims Act lawyers:
These cases are prepared thoroughly and, where necessary, tried, because institutions respond to claims that are ready. A resolution that reflects what a survivor lived through is welcome. One that treats it as a small matter is not.
There is no wrong time to ask a question, and asking one does not start anything you cannot stop. If you want to know whether you still have time, or simply what this would involve, the conversation is free and confidential, and Korman Lynch Lustig & Sassower does not get paid unless there is a recovery.
Call us at (212) 732-4992 24/7 to arrange to speak with a personal injury lawyer about your case, or contact us through our website today.
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