Overview
- The ruling upholds dismissal of Randy Ball’s 2023 lawsuit alleging he was raped as a child in the 1970s at Camp Fatima by a priest employed by the Diocese of Manchester.
- Justice Patrick E. Donovan wrote that retroactively applying the 2020 elimination of civil deadlines would create an unconstitutional retrospective law.
- Under the law in effect at the time, Ball’s window to sue closed in 1986, which the court said conferred a vested right for the diocese to assert the time bar.
- The decision aligns with a recent Maine high court ruling and diverges from decisions in Massachusetts and Maryland that allowed broader retroactive remedies.
- The diocese said decades-old cases are difficult to defend and noted the accused priest died in 2002, while victim advocates warned the decision could discourage survivors from coming forward.