But Shanin Specter, a leading Center City plaintiffs' lawyer, says Pennsylvania courts have issued contradictory rulings on what constitutes forcible sexual molestation, and depending which case is cited, victims could be out of luck.
In the case causing the greatest uncertainty, Commonwealth v. Mlinarich, the state Supreme Court in 1988 threw out a rape conviction, finding that the convicted rapist had not used force by employing a verbal threat.
The man convicted of rape, the guardian of a 14-year-old girl, had told the girl he would send her to a detention center if she refused to have sex with him.
An earlier Supreme Court case, Commonwealth v. Rhodes, produced a seemingly contradictory result. In that case, the court upheld the conviction of a man for raping an 8-year-old boy.
There was no evidence of violent coercion, but the court said the age difference weighed heavily in upholding the conviction.
In the end, Specter says, he expects courts to permit such lawsuits to go forward because common sense suggests the victims were subject to extreme coercion and should have the right to civil damages if they can prove their cases.
But the law is not crystal clear on the subject, he says.
And the fuzziness comes down to when the statute of limitations should expire in these cases.
"If you are under 20 [when one files], you are good; if you are over 30, you are out; if you are between 20 and 30, the statute turns on how you define forcible compulsions," said Specter. "I believe that, ultimately, the claims will get through the statute of limitations because these situations involve a man [Sandusky] in his 50s or 60s with young boys, where he had a domineering position."
