North Carolina
North Carolina Supreme Court upholds law that allowed 2 more years for child sex abuse suits
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina’s highest court upheld on Friday a law that gave adult victims of child sexual abuse two additional years to seek civil damages, rejecting arguments that the temporary window violated constitutional protections for those facing claims that otherwise could no longer be pursued in court.
In a case involving a local school board sued by three former students years after an ex-high school coach was convicted of crimes against team members, the state Supreme Court ruled the General Assembly could enact a key provision within the 2019 SAFE Child Act that was also signed by then-Gov. Roy Cooper.
Before the law, victims of sexual abuse before age 18 effectively had until turning 21 to file such civil claims against perpetrators. Now such victims have until they’re age 28. But the issue before the court in the Gaston County case was the provision that gave other child sex abuse victims whose time period to sue ended the ability to file valid lawsuits for damages from January 2020 through December 2021.
Supporters of the provision said it allowed victims to ensure their abusers and institutions that allowed abuse to happen pay for the damage, and that abusers are called out publicly. At least 250 child sex abuse lawsuits were filed in North Carolina under that one-time lookback period, according to a board legal brief.
A divided state Court of Appeals panel last year had already upheld the two-year window as constitutional.
The board’s attorney had argued the lookback period violated the North Carolina Constitution by stripping away fundamental rights protected from retroactive alterations by the legislature. He also said that upholding the litigation window would make it impossible in some cases to mount vigorous defenses given the passage of time and destroyed records.
Writing Friday’s majority opinion, Chief Justice Paul Newby said a review of previous versions of the state constitution showed that a current provision barring “retrospective laws” expressly applies only to retroactive criminal and tax laws. And another constitutional provision that can be used to strike down laws that violate a person’s rights does not apply here, he added.
“Our precedents confirm that the General Assembly may retroactively amend the statute of limitations for tort claims,” Newby wrote, referring to civil actions in which someone seeks monetary compensation for harm by another.
The coach, Gary Scott Goins, was convicted of 17 sex-related crimes in 2014 and sentenced to at least 34 years in prison. The former student-athletes sued the Gaston County Board of Education and Goins in 2020, alleging he sexually assaulted them on multiple occasions. Goins was later dismissed as a defendant in the current lawsuit, according to court documents. Lawyers for the state help defend the 2019 law in court.
Since 2002, 30 states and the District of Columbia revived previously expired child sex abuse claims with limited or permanent expansions of claim periods, according to CHILD USA, a think tank advocating for children.
Associate Justice Allison Riggs recused herself from Friday’s case, as she wrote the Court of Appeals opinion while she served on the intermediate-level appeals court in 2023. That ruling was largely upheld Friday.
Associate Justice Anita Earls wrote her own opinion Friday that while supporting the outcome criticized harshly the majority for backing Newby’s methodology of evaluating whether a law is constitutional. Earls and Riggs are the two registered Democrats on the seven-member court.
Still, Earls wrote, “all justices would hold that the political branches may enact remedial legislation that empowers survivors of child sexual abuse to recover for the harm they endured at the hands of their abusers and those that enabled the abuse, through civil litigation of claims that would have otherwise been barred by the statute of limitations.”
The matter was one of five cases involving the SAFE Child Act in which oral arguments were heard by the Supreme Court on one day in September.
Three more of these cases were settled Friday. In one, the court agreed that the law’s language permitted lawsuits during the two-year window to be filed against both the perpetrator or the abuse as well as institutions linked to the offender.
That case involved a Catholic layperson accused of sexual abuse in the 1980s. A trial judge had previously ruled that the law’s language only permitted litigation against the alleged abuser, thus dismissed two Catholic entities as defendants. The Supreme Court agreed with the Court of Appeals reversing that decision. Riggs also did not participate in that case.
This spring, more than 62,000 people from North Carolina and
around the world watched as six barn owl eggs hatched live on the North Carolina Wild Life Resource Commission’s “Owl Cam.”
“We have folks who have watched from almost every
state, as well as Canada, Switzerland, Germany, the UK, France, the
Netherlands, Portugal, New Zealand, Italy, Estonia, Ireland, Argentina, Sweden,
Spain and more,” said Wildlife Conservation Engagement Coordinator Austin
Hill.
When asked what he thinks people connect with most while
watching the owls, Hill said the camera offers a rare look into the lives of
barn owls.
“We don’t see them too often at all, and it’s giving
people a glimpse into the life of a barn owl,” Hill said. “It’s very
rare that we’re able to see inside the nest of any creature that’s hidden in a
cavity.”
Hill said viewers enjoyed watching the owlets hatch, grow,
learn to fly and experience all the clumsy moments in between.
At this time all the owls have fledged, meaning they have all learned how to
fly.
“The oldest three owls fledged on the (June)
15th, they’re all females and then the male, the youngest, fledged on
the (June) 20th and you’ll start to see them popping around the
barn,” Hill said.
The webcam will continue to show the adult owls delivering
food to the nest as the owls prepare to leave the barn and learn to hunt.
The
young owls will learn by watching the behaviors of their parents. Depending on their development, the owls could
leave as early as July or as late as September or October.
NCWRC installed the owl nest box in 2011.
It was installed in an undisclosed remote location in Western North Carolina
and used for agency monitoring.
The idea of having a live webcam was a recent idea
created during and Educational Division
meeting.
“It allows us to see what happens in the nest of an
elusive raptor and behaviors we wouldn’t be able to observe from outside the
box,” Hill said. “We’re building out some K-12 curriculum to go along
with the camera so it can extend into the classroom.”
Once the young owls leave, the camera will go offline sometime this fall.
Hill
said staff will perform maintenance on the barn, relocate one of the cameras
and then put the system back in place in hopes that the same owl pair returns
this winter to begin its courtship and mating season. If that happens, the
process can start all over again.
North Carolina
Eastern North Carolina law enforcement agencies warn residents about growing scam threats
EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA — Law enforcement agencies across eastern North Carolina are warning residents to stay alert as several scams continue targeting seniors, bank customers, and other vulnerable individuals.
The Halifax County Sheriff’s Office recently issued a warning after a suspicious check was mailed to a person living with dementia. Deputies say scammers often target older adults by sending fraudulent checks in hopes the recipient will deposit the money and become entangled in a financial scam.
Officials are urging families to regularly check on elderly relatives and remind them never to cash or deposit unexpected checks. Residents are encouraged to contact their bank or law enforcement before taking any action if they receive suspicious financial documents.
Meanwhile, the Onslow County Sheriff’s Office says a jury duty scam is resurfacing throughout the county. In these cases, scammers pose as law enforcement officers or court officials and claim a person missed jury duty or failed to appear in court. Victims are told a warrant has been issued for their arrest and are pressured to send money to avoid being taken into custody.
Deputies warn that scammers often use official-looking documents, government seals, and even the names of real law enforcement officers to make the scheme appear legitimate. The sheriff’s office stresses that deputies will never call, email, or text someone demanding payment.
The Pitt County Sheriff’s Office is also warning residents about a call forwarding scam designed to steal banking verification calls and security codes. Investigators say scammers contact victims claiming there is suspicious activity on their bank account and instruct them to dial special star codes followed by a phone number.
By doing so, victims unknowingly activate call forwarding, allowing bank security calls and verification codes to be redirected to the scammer’s phone.
Authorities recommend never dialing star codes at the request of a stranger, never sharing passwords or security codes, and always contacting banks directly using trusted phone numbers.
Law enforcement agencies say a common theme in many scams is creating a sense of urgency and fear. Officials encourage residents to slow down, verify information independently, and report suspicious activity before sending money or sharing personal information.
North Carolina
Audit finds more than $47M in fraudulent unemployment payments in NC over 5-year period
RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — More than $47 million in fraudulent unemployment payments went out the door in North Carolina over a five-year period, according to a new state audit that also flagged delays in getting benefits to claimants.
The State Auditor’s Office found the North Carolina Division of Employment Security distributed $47.2 million in fraudulent unemployment payments between 2021 and 2025.
“North Carolina had an abysmal rate of recovery and issuing payments that were not appropriate,” State Auditor Dave Boliek said. “Many of them were outright fraudulent.”
According to Boliek, NCDES has recovered about $12.2 million of those funds, but the rest is likely gone forever.
“Once you have a fraudulent transaction and [those funds] are out the door, timing is important to recovering those funds,” he said. “You need to get on it quick in order to get that money back. Otherwise, tracking those dollars down is virtually impossible at this point.”
NCDES Assistant Secretary Marc-Antoine Keith pushed back, saying they are working to recover the money, no matter how long it takes.
“We’re going to be recovering it this year, next year, five years from now,” he said. “We don’t have a timeline. This is not something that we just write off and say, ‘You’re good.’ We’re in the heart of it right now.”
NCDES officials also noted the fraud identified in the audit amounts to less than 1% of the more than $5 billion in unemployment benefits paid during the same period.
According to NCDES, roughly $40 million of the fraudulent payments happened during the COVID-19 pandemic when unemployment claims surged and the state was tasked with administering enhanced federal benefits of $600 per week.
Keith said the department received 1 million claims in just 10 weeks. By comparison, NCDES typically handles about 3,000 to 3,500 claims a week.
“The $600 put North Carolina at a higher profile for bad actors coming into the system,” he said. “We also were under tremendous pressure to get money out the door. Pay, pay, pay, pay, pay. That was the message from the federal government.”
Boliek questioned why it took the agency years to fully implement a federally funded fraud detection system. He said NCDES received a federal grant to strengthen fraud prevention efforts but did not fully deploy the system for three years.
“The pandemic is not an excuse for government’s failure to monitor the expenditure of taxpayer dollars,” he said.
Keith disputed that characterization, pointing to staffing shortages, competing priorities, and Hurricane Helene as reasons for the delay.
“The reality is that we only have so many hands,” he said. “As we got going with this process, then the hurricane came in.”
According to Keith, the fraud detection system was rolled out in phases between April and December 2024 rather than all at once.
The audit also identified problems with delayed payments. According to the report, 28% of initial unemployment payments went out after the federal 14-day benchmark.
“That’s just not acceptable,” Boliek said. “We’ve got to do better than that.
According to Boliek, delays can have serious consequences for families relying on unemployment benefits after losing a job.
“When you’re unemployed or you get laid off, that’s when your family is in a traumatic situation,” he said. “You need to be able to rely on the state to answer the call there and get your benefits to you.”
Keith acknowledged there is still room for improvement but said DES has made progress since the period covered by the audit.
“We’re not where we want to be, but we’re a heck of a lot closer than where we were,” Keith said.
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