Sometimes it only takes one event to spark change.
For many states considering reform to child abuse laws, change is in the works after former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky was charged with child sexual abuse in November. As Pennsylvania discusses amending the law in Title 23, many other states are getting their bills off the ground and on to voting processes.
The change to Title 23 would make a person legally obligated to report child sexual abuse directly to the police. The potential changes have not yet been voted on.
In West Virginia, state Senator Dan Foster, D-Kanawha, has worked with West Virginia Wesleyan College professor Robert Rupp and his students to change the child abuse reporting laws in the state in response to the charges against Sandusky, Foster said.
The class first researched the laws in all the other states to understand how each state’s child abuse reporting law works. Then, after working with Foster, they drafted the bill that passed in the West Virginia senate and is waiting to be voted on in the house.
Rupp said he was concerned with the difference between the moral and legal actions to report child abuse, which has become an issue in many states. States have also debated who should be required by law to report child abuse.
Rupp said he was concerned when he read the late head football coach Joe Paterno’s statement in the grand jury presentment connected to the charges against Sandusky. Though Paterno — who died from lung cancer on Jan. 22 — met his legal obligation, Rupp said it doesn’t seem as if the moral and legal course of action is the same.
According to the grand jury presentment, former assistant coach Mike McQueary told Paterno about a situation involving Sandusky and a young boy in a shower in 2002. According to the presentment, Paterno did not report the information relayed to him to police, but he did notify former Athletic Director Tim Curley and former Vice President for Finance and Business Gary Schultz — both of whom are charged with perjury and failure to report abuse in connection with the Sandusky case.
Following the release of the grand jury presentment, Paterno said in a statement that the situation was a “tragedy” and “one of the great sorrows of [his] life.”
“With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more,” Paterno also said in the statement.
Rupp said he wanted the “Paternos” of the world to have to be responsible for reporting abuse to authorities. Others, like Marci Hamilton, a professor of law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law echoed Rupp.
Hamilton said that something needs to be done to change the child abuse reporting laws in states. States have been re-examining their reporting laws on an ongoing basis, she said.
Hamilton said the penalties should also be greater when it comes to not reporting child abuse. She said for each additional person who knows about child abuse, fines should double or triple.
Connecticut is another state that is looking at changing laws to include Little League and university coaches as those required to report suspected child abuse under the law, Gary Kleeblatt, Connecticut Department of Children and Families spokesperson, said.
Currently, the fine in Connecticut for not reporting child abuse is between $500 and $2,500, and offenders are required to take a training course, said Kleeblatt.
Kleeblatt said the law right now only specifies certain types of professionals required to report child abuse, and their goal is to expand that list, he said. States shouldn’t need a law saying there has to be a legal obligation; the moral obligation to report child abuse should kick in, Kleeblatt said.
Other states, such as Virginia, Missouri, Oregon, Iowa and Maryland are also in the early processes of introducing bills that would reform child abuse reporting laws.