Latest news with #AssemblyBill218
Business Wire
04-08-2025
- Business Wire
Law Firm of Cerri, Boskovich & Allard Announces Two Students Sexually Abused 50 Years Ago Settle Lawsuit With Mountain View Whisman School District for $1.6 Million
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The law firm of Cerri, Boskovich & Allard is reporting that two students sexually abused in the early 1970s have settled their lawsuit against the Mountain View Whisman School District (MVWSD) for $1.6 million. The lawsuit alleged sexual abuse by Steven Myers, a former teacher and vice principal at Crittenden Middle School during the early 1970s. The settlement resolves claims that Myers groomed and assaulted two students in the early 1970s, highlighting serious oversight failures in the district at the time. It took the passage of Assembly Bill 218 in 2020 to extend the statute of limitations for such lawsuits, allowing survivors to seek justice decades after the abuse occurred. 'For decades, school districts like Mountain View Whisman have avoided taking responsibility for the harm they caused to sexual abuse victims,' attorney Lauren Cerri said. 'It took the passage of Assembly Bill 218 in 2020 to extend the statute of limitations for such lawsuits, allowing survivors to seek justice decades after the abuse occurred.' The Mountain View Whisman lawsuit is part of broader legal actions against Myers, who also faced sexual abuse allegations arising from his employment with Santa Cruz City Schools (SCCS), where he served as principal of Branciforte Junior High School from 1981 to 1984 and ran the Traveling School. In 2024, the law firm of Cerri, Boskovich & Allard achieved justice for two more victims of Myers against SCCS. The lawsuit brought by the firm settled for $4.5 million. 'These cases reveal a pattern of misconduct by Myers, who exploited his authority across multiple districts over decades,' Cerri said. Myers, who has gone by many aliases including Stephen Jackson, operated the Traveling School Summer Program, a six-week initiative for students with behavioral and academic challenges, at both Crittenden and later in Santa Cruz. The program, described as a "school on wheels," included controversial elements like "Body Theme Days," where students were required to wear minimal clothing, and massage sessions led by Myers. Depositions revealed a lack of oversight, with no policies governing teacher-student interactions or background checks conducted on Myers. Across five decades, from 1968 to 2018, at least 11 men have reported sexual abuse by Myers, with over 20 alleging inappropriate conduct during their minor years in locations including Mountain View, Santa Cruz, and Denver. Despite these allegations, Myers has not faced criminal prosecution due to statutes of limitations. His teaching credentials were revoked in California and Colorado following reports of misconduct. The settlements by MVWSD and SCCS mark steps toward accountability for past failures, providing some justice for survivors. These cases underscore the critical need for rigorous background checks, oversight, and policies to protect students in educational settings. This press release may constitute Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.
Los Angeles Times
02-07-2025
- Los Angeles Times
Facing 153 sexual abuse cases, the Fresno Diocese seeks bankruptcy. Critics call it delay tactic
Bogged down by 153 claims of clergy sex abuse, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno announced Tuesday it voluntarily filed a petition for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The financial reorganization process comes more than a year after the diocese declared its initial intent to seek relief in U.S. bankruptcy court. Fresno church officials said the action will help them avoid insolvency, while victims of abuse and their attorneys excoriated the church for what they describe as delay tactics to help the diocese evade justice. Church officials are scheduled at Eastern District Court in Fresno on Monday for their next hearing in front of Judge René Lastreto II. 'I am clear-sighted that this path is the only path that will allow us to handle claims of sexual abuse with fair, equitable compassion while simultaneously ensuring the continuation of ministry within our Diocese,' Bishop Joseph V. Brennan wrote in a letter to parishioners. 'Our Church must address the suffering that victims of clergy sexual abuse endure.' Although the church has not conceded responsibility on all 153 claims, Brennan said a fund will be established by the court for distribution to survivors. Jeff Anderson, whose law firm has represented clergy abuse victims in 11 of California's 12 dioceses, including the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, said the proceedings help the diocese and bishop avoid accountability. 'By forcing survivors into bankruptcy court, they are once again denying responsibility,' Anderson wrote in a statement. 'But we will stand with survivors and fight for the full measure of truth, justice, and healing they deserve.' In May 2024, the church acknowledged more than 150 sexual abuse claims made against it since Assembly Bill 218 was enacted in January 2020. AB 218 opened a three-year window for some civil sexual assault claims that previously timed out due to the statute of limitations. The deadline to file a claim closed Dec. 31, 2022, under the legislation. Attorney Jennifer Stein said all 50 of the firm's clients filed lawsuits directly because of AB 218, with one filing in 2019 in anticipation of the Assembly bill's passage. She said most victims were children forever 'scarred' by the trauma that stemmed from clergy abuse. 'That's trauma that stays with you throughout your professional and academic career, in interpersonal relationships and marriages,' she said. 'Each and every single survivor has a story to tell as a result of their abuse and that isn't highlighted enough.' Stein said that bankruptcy robs victims of the spotlight and converts court proceedings into a focus on property and corporate structure that could span several years. 'As compared to state court litigation, bankruptcy is about the church's ability to pay,' she said. Fresno's diocese includes more than 1 million Catholics among 87 parishes and 21 schools from Fresno, Kern, Kings, Inyo, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties. The diocese released a list of 63 clergy and lay people accused in 2021, including ordained priests as early as 1906. Though most were local, some clergy hailed from Guatemala, France, Ireland, Mexico and the Philippines. On Monday, attorney Rick Simons filed a motion in court calling for an investigation into Fresno's bankruptcy announcement. He said he believes the more than year-long lag since May 2024 was fraudulently used to delay several dozen cases. Simons manages a legal proceeding called Northern California Clergy Cases, in which nearly 1,800 individual lawsuits have been filed against seven Catholic dioceses, including Fresno. Simons told The Times the advantages for the church include survivors dying out, getting tired and quitting or greatly reducing their expectations. He also noted that the church could have used this time to rearrange money and property to make sure certain funds or accounts are not part of the debtor's estate. The declared intent for bankruptcy also 'stops jury trials and discovery from going forward while cases are waiting for bankruptcy,' according to Simons. The church declined to comment on the accusation. Church officials have said that they do not expect an impact to diocese-run elementary and high schools along with catholic charities and other area affiliates. Though diocese officials have said they also do not expect an impact at Catholic cemeteries, those properties have been listed in the Chapter 11 filing. The diocese acknowledged that the value of Diocesan assets available to resolve claims, including any available insurance coverage, may not be sufficient to cover the claims and could leave the diocese insolvent. The diocese also verified that it was not receiving any financial help from the Vatican.
Miami Herald
19-06-2025
- Miami Herald
California school district faces sex abuse lawsuit. Did LA's $4-billion payout open floodgates?
LOS ANGELES - Five California women sued a Fresno County school system Wednesday, alleging officials brushed aside claims they were being sexually assaulted by a second-grade teacher who was later convicted of similar abuse. The case against the Clovis Unified School District comes amid a tidal wave of sexual abuse litigation that has left lawmakers scrambling to stop misconduct - and schools struggling to pay settlements owed to victims suing over crimes that stretch back decades. The latest case dates back to the late 1990s and early 2000s. Plaintiff Samantha Muñoz, now a 28-year-old mother of two, is among those alleging she was abused by then-Fancher Creek Elementary School teacher Neng Yang. Muñoz claims in the lawsuit that Yang began molesting her in 2004, when she was his 7-year-old student. By that time, the lawsuit says, girls had been complaining to Clovis Unified School District officials about Yang for years. The teacher was eventually arrested for producing child pornography in 2012, and has spent the past decade in federal prison in San Pedro, where he is serving a 38-year term for sexual exploitation of a minor. "Clovis Unified was protecting this predator," said Muñoz. "They continued to have him teaching at that school knowing he was [assaulting students]." The Times does not typically identify victims of sexual assault, but Muñoz and two of her four co-plaintiffs said they wanted to speak out publicly about what happened. Kelly Avants, a spokeswoman for Clovis Unified, said the district had not yet received notice of the lawsuit. "We have not been served with the suit yet, but will review it when we are served and respond accordingly," Avants said. The public defender's office that represented Yang in his criminal case referred questions to federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of California. A spokesperson for that office said they could offer no comment. "When a teacher saw him showing me child pornography on his phone, school officials interrogated me and then encouraged me to say nothing," Muñoz said. "I was left in his classroom and he kept abusing me." The Fresno case follows a landmark $4-billion settlement this spring over sexual abuse in L.A. County's juvenile facilities, group and foster homes - believed to be the largest in U.S. history. On Tuesday, the state's largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, announced it would sell up to $500 million in bonds to help cover its anticipated sexual abuse liability. "There's tremendous cost pressures on school districts," said Michael Fine, head of California's Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, which published a report in January estimating state education agencies could be liable for $2 billion to $3 billion for past sexual misconduct. "No matter what, the money's coming out of their current resources." The payouts stem from a series of recent changes to California's statute of limitations for child sexual assault. Beginning with Assembly Bill 218 in 2019, the state opened a brief window for allegations going back as far as 1940. The law permanently extended the deadline for victims to file child sex abuse claims until age 40, or within five years of realizing a new illness or "psychological injury" as a result of abuse. "There are definitely school districts out there that feel the state changed the law so the state should pay," Fine said. Some in the debate argue only abusers - not cash-strapped schools - should be liable for misconduct. For most California school districts, the money is likely to come from a public entity risk pool, a collective pot that multiple agencies pay into to cover liabilities such as health insurance and workers' compensation. Many pools are assessing their members "retroactive premiums" in an attempt to cover sex abuse suits touched off by the change in the law, Fine said. That means even schools that haven't been sued face higher operating costs. "There's impacts to the classroom whether there's a claim or not, because they've got to pay the retroactive premiums somehow," he said. "If they were in the pool, they're on the hook." In its report, the agency recommended alternative ways the state and school districts might cover liabilities stemming from the law - including a modified form of receivership for agencies that can't pay, and a new state victim's compensation fund - as well as concrete steps to stem abuse. The latter have been enthusiastically adopted by California lawmakers, including state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra). But other suggestions have been ignored, Fine said. "There isn't a bill out there that carries the rest of our recommendations," he said. After months spent trying to understand the scale and the magnitude of the liability California institutions are facing, stories like those in the Clovis Unified suit haunt him, Fine said. "It's emotionally overwhelming," he said. Plaintiffs in the Clovis case described nearly identical abuse stretching back to 1998, when Yang was still a student teacher. According to Wednesday's complaint, then-second-grader Tiffany Thrailkill told the Francher Creek principal, vice principal and school counselor that Yang had groped her and forced her to perform oral sex. "In response, [officials] took the position that Tiffany was lying and referred her to psychological treatment," the suit alleged. Despite laws dating back to the 1980s that require abuse to be reported, school officials kept the allegations quiet and never investigated Yang, the suit said. "Instead of reporting Yang and protecting their students, it appears school officials blamed the girls, looked the other way, and enabled Yang to abuse their students for over a decade," said Jason Amala, the plaintiffs' attorney. Ultimately, Yang was caught by the Central California Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, a partnership between the Clovis Police Department and Homeland Security Investigations. For Muñoz, the teacher's conviction was cold comfort. While she believes speaking out about her experience will inspire other victims to come forward, she now faces the agonizing decision of whether to send her nonverbal 4-year-old for early intervention services at the same elementary school where her suit alleges her nightmare began. "Why would I want to go drop off my son at a place that's nothing but bad memories?" the mother said. "It's like signing my life away to the devil again." "I just need them to be accountable for who they protected," Muñoz said. Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Yahoo
California school district faces sex abuse lawsuit. Did L.A.'s $4-billion payout open floodgates?
Five California women sued a Fresno County school system Wednesday, alleging officials brushed aside claims they were being sexually assaulted by a second-grade teacher who was later convicted of similar abuse. The case against the Clovis Unified School District comes amid a tidal wave of sexual abuse litigation that has left lawmakers scrambling to stop misconduct — and schools struggling to pay settlements owed to victims suing over crimes that stretch back decades. The latest case dates back to the late 1990s and early 2000s. Plaintiff Samantha Muñoz, now a 28-year-old mother of two, is among those alleging she was abused by then-Fancher Creek Elementary School teacher Neng Yang. Muñoz claims in the lawsuit that Yang began molesting her in 2004, when she was his 7-year-old student. By that time, the lawsuit says, girls had been complaining to Clovis Unified School District officials about Yang for years. The teacher was eventually arrested for producing child pornography in 2012, and has spent the past decade in federal prison in San Pedro, where he is serving a 38-year term for sexual exploitation of a minor. "Clovis Unified was protecting this predator," said Muñoz. "They continued to have him teaching at that school knowing he was [assaulting students]." The Times does not typically identify victims of sexual assault, but Muñoz and two of her four co-plaintiffs said they wanted to speak out publicly about what happened. Kelly Avants, a spokeswoman for Clovis Unified, said the district had not yet received notice of the lawsuit. "We have not been served with the suit yet, but will review it when we are served and respond accordingly," Avants said. The public defender's office that represented Yang in his criminal case referred questions to federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of California. A spokesperson for that office said they could offer no comment. "When a teacher saw him showing me child pornography on his phone, school officials interrogated me and then encouraged me to say nothing," Muñoz said. "I was left in his classroom and he kept abusing me." The Fresno case follows a landmark $4-billion settlement this spring over sexual abuse in L.A. County's juvenile facilities, group and foster homes — believed to be the largest in U.S. history. On Tuesday, the state's largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, announced it would sell up to $500 million in bonds to help cover its anticipated sexual abuse liability. "There's tremendous cost pressures on school districts," said Michael Fine, head of California's Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, which published a report in January estimating state education agencies could be liable for $2 billion to $3 billion for past sexual misconduct. "No matter what, the money's coming out of their current resources." The payouts stem from a series of recent changes to California's statute of limitations for child sexual assault. Beginning with Assembly Bill 218 in 2019, the state opened a brief window for allegations going back as far as 1940. The law permanently extended the deadline for victims to file child sex abuse claims until age 40, or within five years of realizing a new illness or "psychological injury" as a result of abuse. "There are definitely school districts out there that feel the state changed the law so the state should pay," Fine said. Some in the debate argue only abusers — not cash-strapped schools — should be liable for misconduct. For most California school districts, the money is likely to come from a public entity risk pool, a collective pot that multiple agencies pay into to cover liabilities such as health insurance and workers' compensation. Many pools are assessing their members "retroactive premiums" in an attempt to cover sex abuse suits touched off by the change in the law, Fine said. That means even schools that haven't been sued face higher operating costs. "There's impacts to the classroom whether there's a claim or not, because they've got to pay the retroactive premiums somehow," he said. "If they were in the pool, they're on the hook." In its report, the agency recommended alternative ways the state and school districts might cover liabilities stemming from the law — including a modified form of receivership for agencies that can't pay, and a new state victim's compensation fund — as well as concrete steps to stem abuse. The latter have been enthusiastically adopted by California lawmakers, including state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra). But other suggestions have been ignored, Fine said. "There isn't a bill out there that carries the rest of our recommendations," he said. After months spent trying to understand the scale and the magnitude of the liability California institutions are facing, stories like those in the Clovis Unified suit haunt him, Fine said. "It's emotionally overwhelming," he said. Plaintiffs in the Clovis case described nearly identical abuse stretching back to 1998, when Yang was still a student teacher. According to Wednesday's complaint, then-second-grader Tiffany Thrailkill told the Francher Creek principal, vice principal and school counselor that Yang had groped her and forced her to perform oral sex. "In response, [officials] took the position that Tiffany was lying and referred her to psychological treatment," the suit alleged. Despite laws dating back to the 1980s that require abuse to be reported, school officials kept the allegations quiet and never investigated Yang, the suit said. "Instead of reporting Yang and protecting their students, it appears school officials blamed the girls, looked the other way, and enabled Yang to abuse their students for over a decade,' said Jason Amala, the plaintiffs' attorney. Ultimately, Yang was caught by the Central California Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, a partnership between the Clovis Police Department and Homeland Security Investigations. For Muñoz, the teacher's conviction was cold comfort. While she believes speaking out about her experience will inspire other victims to come forward, she now faces the agonizing decision of whether to send her nonverbal 4-year-old for early intervention services at the same elementary school where her suit alleges her nightmare began. "Why would I want to go drop off my son at a place that's nothing but bad memories?" the mother said. "It's like signing my life away to the devil again." "I just need them to be accountable for who they protected," Muñoz said. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
19-06-2025
- Los Angeles Times
California school district faces sex abuse lawsuit. Did L.A.'s $4-billion payout open floodgates?
Five California women sued a Fresno County school system Wednesday, alleging officials brushed aside claims they were being sexually assaulted by a second-grade teacher who was later convicted of similar abuse. The case against the Clovis Unified School District comes amid a tidal wave of sexual abuse litigation that has left lawmakers scrambling to stop misconduct — and schools struggling to pay settlements owed to victims suing over crimes that stretch back decades. The latest case dates back to the late 1990s and early 2000s. Plaintiff Samantha Muñoz, now a 28-year-old mother of two, is among those alleging she was abused by then-Fancher Creek Elementary School teacher Neng Yang. Muñoz claims in the lawsuit that Yang began molesting her in 2004, when she was his 7-year-old student. By that time, the lawsuit says, girls had been complaining to Clovis Unified School District officials about Yang for years. The teacher was eventually arrested for producing child pornography in 2012, and has spent the past decade in federal prison in San Pedro, where he is serving a 38-year term for sexual exploitation of a minor. 'Clovis Unified was protecting this predator,' said Muñoz. 'They continued to have him teaching at that school knowing he was [assaulting students].' The Times does not typically identify victims of sexual assault, but Muñoz and two of her four co-plaintiffs said they wanted to speak out publicly about what happened. Kelly Avants, a spokeswoman for Clovis Unified, said the district had not yet received notice of the lawsuit. 'We have not been served with the suit yet, but will review it when we are served and respond accordingly,' Avants said. The public defender's office that represented Yang in his criminal case referred questions to federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of California. A spokesperson for that office said they could offer no comment. 'When a teacher saw him showing me child pornography on his phone, school officials interrogated me and then encouraged me to say nothing,' Muñoz said. 'I was left in his classroom and he kept abusing me.' The Fresno case follows a landmark $4-billion settlement this spring over sexual abuse in L.A. County's juvenile facilities, group and foster homes — believed to be the largest in U.S. history. On Tuesday, the state's largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, announced it would sell up to $500 million in bonds to help cover its anticipated sexual abuse liability. 'There's tremendous cost pressures on school districts,' said Michael Fine, head of California's Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, which published a report in January estimating state education agencies could be liable for $2 billion to $3 billion for past sexual misconduct. 'No matter what, the money's coming out of their current resources.' The payouts stem from a series of recent changes to California's statute of limitations for child sexual assault. Beginning with Assembly Bill 218 in 2019, the state opened a brief window for allegations going back as far as 1940. The law permanently extended the deadline for victims to file child sex abuse claims until age 40, or within five years of realizing a new illness or 'psychological injury' as a result of abuse. 'There are definitely school districts out there that feel the state changed the law so the state should pay,' Fine said. Some in the debate argue only abusers — not cash-strapped schools — should be liable for misconduct. For most California school districts, the money is likely to come from a public entity risk pool, a collective pot that multiple agencies pay into to cover liabilities such as health insurance and workers' compensation. Many pools are assessing their members 'retroactive premiums' in an attempt to cover sex abuse suits touched off by the change in the law, Fine said. That means even schools that haven't been sued face higher operating costs. 'There's impacts to the classroom whether there's a claim or not, because they've got to pay the retroactive premiums somehow,' he said. 'If they were in the pool, they're on the hook.' In its report, the agency recommended alternative ways the state and school districts might cover liabilities stemming from the law — including a modified form of receivership for agencies that can't pay, and a new state victim's compensation fund — as well as concrete steps to stem abuse. The latter have been enthusiastically adopted by California lawmakers, including state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra). But other suggestions have been ignored, Fine said. 'There isn't a bill out there that carries the rest of our recommendations,' he said. After months spent trying to understand the scale and the magnitude of the liability California institutions are facing, stories like those in the Clovis Unified suit haunt him, Fine said. 'It's emotionally overwhelming,' he said. Plaintiffs in the Clovis case described nearly identical abuse stretching back to 1998, when Yang was still a student teacher. According to Wednesday's complaint, then-second-grader Tiffany Thrailkill told the Francher Creek principal, vice principal and school counselor that Yang had groped her and forced her to perform oral sex. 'In response, [officials] took the position that Tiffany was lying and referred her to psychological treatment,' the suit alleged. Despite laws dating back to the 1980s that require abuse to be reported, school officials kept the allegations quiet and never investigated Yang, the suit said. 'Instead of reporting Yang and protecting their students, it appears school officials blamed the girls, looked the other way, and enabled Yang to abuse their students for over a decade,' said Jason Amala, the plaintiffs' attorney. Ultimately, Yang was caught by the Central California Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, a partnership between the Clovis Police Department and Homeland Security Investigations. For Muñoz, the teacher's conviction was cold comfort. While she believes speaking out about her experience will inspire other victims to come forward, she now faces the agonizing decision of whether to send her nonverbal 4-year-old for early intervention services at the same elementary school where her suit alleges her nightmare began. 'Why would I want to go drop off my son at a place that's nothing but bad memories?' the mother said. 'It's like signing my life away to the devil again.' 'I just need them to be accountable for who they protected,' Muñoz said.
