[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 3]
[Senate]
[Pages 3499-3501]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             PROTECTING YOUNG VICTIMS FROM SEXUAL ABUSE ACT

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, yesterday I introduced the Protecting 
Young Victims from Sexual Abuse Act, a bill to protect young athletes 
who participate in the U.S. amateur ranks from sexual abuse.
  Before last summer's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, the 
Indianapolis Star published an investigative piece that revealed that 
amateur gymnasts were sexually abused in gyms all across the country. 
No one knew how widespread the problem was in that sport.
  But throughout the investigation, the Indianapolis Star tallied--
after reviewing police files and court cases across the country--368 
gymnasts who alleged they were sexually abused over a 20-year time 
period.
  Kids as young as 6 were secretly photographed in the nude by coaches. 
Young athletes were molested by coaches during ``therapy'' sessions. 
Sexual predators spent countless hours with children one-on-one and 
abused them for years before anything was done. These accounts were 
devastating. And they were just the tip of the iceberg.
  After reviewing this report, I, along with my colleagues Senator 
Leahy, Senator Blumenthal, and Senator Donnelly, wrote to USA 
Gymnastics to urge the organization to do more to protect their young 
athletes.
  Specifically, we urged the organization to update its policies and 
require that all members--including coaches, athletes, and others--
immediately report to law enforcement when there is an incident of 
sexual abuse committed against an athlete.
  After we sent the letter, several sexual abuse victims from 
California reached out to my staff. They revealed that they were abused 
by individuals affiliated with USA Gymnastics. I told my staff that I 
had to meet them.
  Six brave women, who were each abused as young gymnasts at various 
points in their careers, then travelled across the country to share 
their testimonies with me. Two athletes from another sport who were 
sexually abused

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also joined us. I will never forget their faces that day. When I walked 
into the room, I could sense the overwhelming devastation wrought on 
their lives.
  One by one, they shared their hopes and dreams as young athletes. The 
gymnasts talked about how, while pursuing future Olympic glory, they 
put their complete faith in the USA Gymnastics infrastructure. They 
fully trusted the coaches and doctors who had the USA Gymnastics seal 
of approval. And it was in this environment that they were sexually 
exploited by those whom they trusted.
  Several of the women had been abused repeatedly--over the course of 
months and years--by a USA Gymnastics team doctor named Larry Nassar. 
Nassar is currently being prosecuted for a number of horrific crimes 
against children. One of those brave women was Jamie Dantzscher, a 
retired gymnast who won the bronze medal competing in the 2000 Olympics 
in Sydney. Jamie told me how she trained as a young girl in California. 
When she was 13 years old, she was thrilled to be invited to train with 
the national USA Gymnastics team. It was with the national team that 
Nassar gained her trust. Nassar became her ``buddy,'' in the midst of 
an intense training environment. With USA Gymnastics backing him as a 
famous doctor and trainer, Jamie felt that there was absolutely no 
reason to believe Nassar was not trustworthy.
  So when Jamie went to see Nassar for back pain, she was confused when 
Nassar began to touch her in inappropriate places. She was 13 and 14 
years old. As she described the abuse to me in graphic detail, the 
other women around the room began to sob quietly. The tactics that 
Nassar used were too familiar to them.
  And for the longest time, each of the victims believed that their 
horrific experiences were one-off events, that they were isolated in 
their own subjective memories. But the sharing of their stories--
together in that room with me and the others--affirmed to them that 
what they had experienced was wrong.
  One of the other gymnasts who bravely shared her story with me was 
Jeanette Antolin, who competed on the national team in the late 
nineties. Hailing from southern California, Jeanette shared how she was 
incredibly fearful of ever saying anything about the abuse committed 
against her because she believed she was being treated by a world-class 
doctor with USA Gymnastics' approval. As an aspiring Olympian, she 
feared that if she complained about anything, it would affect her 
career.
  The same fears had overcome Jessica Howard, a rhythmic gymnast who 
was 15 years old when Nassar began abusing her. She was sent to Nassar 
for hip problems, and he told her that she should not wear any 
underwear for her treatment. At the time, she was confused and afraid 
to say anything to anyone. She believed she would be prevented from 
pursuing her dreams if she said anything.
  I also met Doe Yamashiro from southern California. Doe was sexually 
abused by a 1984 Olympic Coach named Don Peters. In the mid-1980s, 
Coach Peters began fondling Doe and then had sex with her. Doe told me 
and the group of the pain and anguish she still suffers from many years 
later. The same pain and devastation was felt by all of the young 
victims who were in the room.
  One of the common themes I heard from their stories was not just the 
predatory behavior of the perpetrators, but also how the USA Gymnastics 
institution failed to protect them. One of the women told me how she 
heard USA Gymnastics officials say at one point that it was their top 
priority to obtain ``medals and money'' and that a ``reputation of a 
coach'' should not be tarnished by an allegation raised by a victim.
  This shocked me, and as I dug deeper into the USA Gymnastics 
institution, which is considered a ``national governing body'' under 
Federal law and oversees over 3,000 gymnasiums nationwide, I saw that 
their policies made it harder for victims, rather than easier, to 
report incidents of abuse. Their bylaws stated, for example, that the 
only way for a member athlete to ``effectively'' make a complaint about 
a coach was through a signed, written complaint.
  Furthermore, USA Gymnastics' policy indicated that the organization 
``may'' report sexual abuse to law enforcement authorities if a child's 
safety was at risk, but it was not mandatory. It further stated that it 
complied with State mandatory reporting laws, but if a State law didn't 
require anything more, there was no other obligation to do anything 
else.
  It is my strong belief that these arcane policies left children 
vulnerable to the advances of sexual predators and failed to protect 
them even when incidents came to light. For example, in reviewing USA 
Gymnastics' history in public accounts, there were multiple instances 
where gymnastics coaches were convicted of heinous child sex crimes, 
years after USA Gymnastics had received complaints about those coaches. 
In other words, USA Gymnastics appears to have sat on reports of sexual 
abuse for years, while predators continued to prey on children.
  At the end of my meeting with the survivors, I looked at each of them 
and told them that I would work on legislation to protect other kids 
and amateur athletes like them from sexual predators.
  The legislation we have introduced does three main things to help 
child sex abuse survivors. It is a strong bipartisan bill, and I want 
to extend my deepest thanks to those Members who have worked with me on 
it, including Senators Collins, Grassley, Donnelly, Nelson, Blumenthal, 
Flake, McCaskill, Ernst, Klobuchar, Shaheen, Warren, Harris, Cortez-
Masto, Rubio, and Young.
  The first thing the bill does is to mandate that any person 
affiliated with USA Gymnastics or other national governing bodies 
immediately report child abuse, including sexual abuse, to local or 
Federal law enforcement. This requirement would apply not only to USA 
Gymnastics, but to each of the other 47 national governing bodies that 
oversee various Olympic sports, including USA Taekwondo, USA Speed 
Skating, USA Swimming, and USA Cycling. It is absolutely imperative 
that a bright line be drawn for all those working with national 
governing bodies that, once there are facts giving rise to suspect 
child or sex abuse, a report must be made as soon as possible to proper 
authorities. This bill mandates that.
  Second, this bill strengthens Masha's law, which was named after a 5-
year-old Russian orphan who was adopted by an American man only to be 
raped and sexually abused by him for 6 years until he was finally 
caught by the FBI in 2003. Her adoptive father had not only abused her, 
but he had also produced over 200 sexually explicit images of that 
abuse. Masha's law allows civil suits by minors against sex abuse 
perpetrators who violate a variety of crimes against children, 
including sex trafficking, sexual exploitation, and child pornography 
crimes.
  This law is significant for victims to obtain justice because there 
are times when criminal cases against perpetrators are declined due to 
difficulties in proving a criminal case. Therefore, for many 
traumatized victims, the only avenue for them to ever seek justice 
against their perpetrators is through Masha's law or other civil 
remedies.
  The bill, therefore, updates Masha's law to help victims. It 
clarifies, for example, that victims of child sex crimes are entitled 
to statutory damages of $150,000 and possible punitive damages, due to 
the particularly severe nature of the crimes.
  The bill also extends the statute of limitations for Masha's law. The 
statute of limitations extension is part of legislation that Senator 
Cornyn and I have worked on over the past couple of years, called the 
Extending Justice for Sex Crime Victims Act.
  Finally, the bill makes reforms to the Ted Stevens Olympic and 
Amateur Sports Act, which establishes ``national governing bodies'' 
like USA Gymnastics. The Stevens Act specifically lists the authorities 
and duties of national governing bodies.
  When I first wrote to USA Gymnastics about its poor handling of 
sexual abuse allegations, they replied that

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the Stevens Act limits their abilities to fully protect athletes from 
sexual abuse, so this bill fixes that. It requires national governing 
bodies like USA Gymnastics to develop for each of its members: specific 
policies and procedures for the mandatory reporting of sex abuse to law 
enforcement, policies and procedures to keep track of coaches who leave 
one gym due to complaints and then go to another gym and repeat cycles 
of abuse, policies to ensure that minors and amateur athletes are not 
in one-on-one situations with adults, policies to facilitate reporting 
of sex abuse allegations to national governing bodies and other 
authorities, and stronger oversight and enforcement policies so that 
the national governing bodies take a greater role in making sure that 
the policies are actually being implemented and enforced throughout the 
country.
  These provisions give national governing bodies like USA Gymnastics 
absolutely no excuse to make sure that all members are subjected to the 
strongest training and procedures to prevent sexual abuse.
  It further forces organizations like USA Gymnastics to impact the 
culture of their sports, through various oversight mechanisms, to make 
sure that all members of such organizations adhere to the strictest 
standards when it comes to sexual abuse prevention.
  Finally, I would like to close with this. All over the country, 
victims of sexual abuse are coming forward to disclose how they were 
abused and exploited at the height of their innocence when they were 
children. Multiple victims from California and throughout the country 
have, for example, contacted my office and described with great courage 
their pain and anguish. Rather than list statistics, I want you to know 
that each of these individual stories represents an untold amount of 
pain and suffering that reverberates throughout generations, leaving 
devastation in its path. I urge my colleagues in this body to work with 
me and the sponsors of this bill to pass this important legislation to 
protect victims.
  I would also like to acknowledge the support for this bill from the 
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, National Children's 
Alliance, Rights4Girls, University of Utah Law Professor Paul Cassell, 
Child Sex Crime Victims' Lawyer James Marsh, Crime Victims Expert Steve 
Twist, National Crime Victims Center, Child USA, National Association 
of VOCA Administrators, National Organization for Victim Assistance, 
ToPrevail, ChampionWomen, National Children's Advocacy Center, National 
Alliance to End Sexual Violence, the National Association to Protect 
Children, and the Rape Abuse & Incest National Network.
  They are on the front lines of this work, and I greatly appreciate 
their support.
  Thank you very much.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, today I wish to support the Protecting 
Young Victims from Sexual Abuse Act of 2017. I commend Senator 
Feinstein for her leadership on this bill and for shining a spotlight 
on the atrocious crimes perpetrated against young American athletes.
  Sexual abuse is a heinous crime that must be eradicated in every 
corner of our society. I have long worked to prevent sexual assault and 
ensure that survivors have access to the resources and support they 
need. Last year, the Indianapolis Star reported on allegations of 
sexual abuse and misconduct made against coaches, gym owners, and other 
adults affiliated with USA Gymnastics over several decades. These very 
serious allegations included sexual abuse against young athletes. 
Predatory coaches were allowed to move from gym to gym, undetected by a 
lax system of oversight. The investigation also revealed that officials 
at USA Gymnastics, one of America's most prominent Olympic 
organizations, failed to alert police to many incidents of sexual abuse 
that occurred on their watch.
  These crimes have hurt hundreds of victims across various sports. 
This Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Assault Act would require 
amateur athletic governing bodies, such as USA Gymnastics and other 
U.S. Olympic organizations, to promptly report every allegation of 
sexual abuse to the proper authorities. This legislation would help 
survivors receive justice and protect more people from becoming 
victims.
  In addition, the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Assault Act 
would require these national governing bodies to develop robust 
policies and procedures for mandatory reporting to law enforcement and 
to develop training and oversight practices to prevent abuse. This bill 
would also bolster Masha's Law, the law that lets minors bring civil 
suits against sexual predators and extends the statute of limitations 
for such cases.
  The young athletes who train to represent our country at the top 
levels of competition and those at all levels who aspire to compete 
should not have to fear victimization by trusted coaches and sports 
officials. I want to again thank Senator Feinstein for her leadership 
on this issue. I urge my colleagues to support the legislation.

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