CLEVELAND, Ohio – Nearly a decade ago, while working on a special reporting project examining how Cleveland police for years had marginalized sexual assault victims -- failing to test evidence or follow through on investigations -- this cynical thought occurred to me: If men, rather than women and girls, were the primary victims of those crimes, rape would be considered a true public health epidemic, and every available government resource would be committed to addressing it.
Since then, a statewide DNA testing initiative has gone far toward resolving massive backlogs of untested sexual assault evidence kits. And the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements have ushered in a national reckoning with the prevalence of sexual assault in America and the ways in which trauma, social stigma and other forces conspire to prevent victims from coming forward, sometimes for many years.
In short, there was reason to believe that, as a society, we were finally evolving.
But the unfair way in which the male-dominated Ohio Statehouse is handling two proposed bills dealing with statutes of limitations in sexual assault cases, has renewed my belief that sexism and a lack of empathy for women and girls continue to guide public policy when it comes to sex crimes.
In May, an Ohio State University investigation concluded that former university physician Richard Strauss had sexually abused at least 177 young men between 1979 and 1998. Strauss was never charged with a crime and killed himself in 2005. But as a result of the report, more than 350 men sued OSU, saying they had been abused. And Gov. Mike DeWine and Attorney General Dave Yost, both Republicans, rightly called on the GOP dominated Ohio House and Senate to eliminate Ohio’s arbitrary statute of limitations for rape and sexual assault victims.
Two House bills emerged in the aftermath.
One, Republican-sponsored House Bill 249, would waive the statute of limitations specifically so victims could sue OSU and recover financial damages. Since the bill’s introduction in May, Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder has thrown his full support behind it, and the House’s Civil Justice Committee has held six hearings on the legislation.
A second bill introduced by House Democrats in June, House Bill 279 seeks to waive the statute of limitations for all criminal sexual assault and rape cases, not just those at OSU, while also closing a medieval loophole in Ohio’s law that bans the prosecution of spousal rape when no threat of force or violence occurred. (In other words, under the current law, one could use drugs to incapacitate a spouse and engage in sex with them without consent.)
Although the Senate is expected to hold a hearing on a companion piece today, not a single hearing has been held on the House bill.
Strauss’s victims have suffered in silence long enough and certainly deserve justice. But the differences in the way the two House bills are being treated are impossible to reconcile. To push forth a proposal to eliminate the statute of limitations for a set of male victims while completely ignoring legislation that would support all survivors of rape – most of whom are women and girls – smacks of sexism.
When confronted about the disparity at a forum organized by the Associated Press of Ohio earlier this month, Householder said he prefers not to retroactively change laws. He added that he’s sensitive to the plight of victims and the difficulty they face in coming forward, but that statutes of limitations are important because memories can fade over time.
“I know that people, particularly women, are in a position sometimes that they don’t feel like they can step out,” Householder said. “... That’s one of those things that makes our job very difficult at times, and we have to balance the scales constantly and try to keep things as fair as we can.”
I’m not entirely sure what Householder is trying to say in that epic dodge of a reporter’s question. But his argument about the fallibility of memory collapses when one considers that the accusations against Strauss are between two and four decades old, and no one -- including me -- is making the case that those men might be misremembering their encounters with him or questioning whether they were consensual.
No, that skepticism seems to be reserved for another set of victims: Women, whose credibility apparently expires after 25 years, though their trauma and suffering do not.
Advancements in DNA testing technology provide perhaps the strongest argument for abolishing the statute of limitations. If properly stored and handled, the crime-solving power of DNA can be accessed for decades. Today, law enforcement can better identify suspects or exonerate defendants through DNA analysis. And, as we saw when thousands of previously untested rape kits throughout Ohio were finally entered into offender databases, DNA can help investigators bring serial rapists to justice after years at large. Preserving an arbitrary deadline on the prosecution of those cases by letting HB 279 stagnate in the Criminal Justice Committee’s queue only makes Ohio less safe.
It may take a victim years to overcome the many psychological and social barriers to reporting an attack. But every survivor of sexual assault should have confidence that the system will support them when they do – regardless of whether men who lead the Ohio Statehouse can identify with them or what they’ve been through.
Note to readers: Soon I will be taking a break from my column to embark on maternity leave that will last through the spring. But I will continue to check email regularly. You can reach me at: latassi@cleveland.com.