SB 1181, An Act Concerning the Statute of Limitations for Crimes Committed Against the Elderly

The ACLU-CT is an organization dedicated to ending mass incarceration, eliminating racial disparities in the criminal legal system, and reducing harms to justice-impacted people. SB 1181 would alter how statutes of limitation typically work by starting the clock at the discovery of the commission of the offense, rather than the commission of the offense. This change is concerning because given the broadly expanded period of time, evidence is likely to be lost, destroyed, or deteriorated. As time goes on, the memory of witnesses becomes unreliable, witnesses may no longer have the capacity to testify at all, and witnesses may be difficult to find because they have since moved. All of these problems will make it more difficult to fairly try cases with accurate evidence, which could result in wrongful conviction or mistrial.