Track

Status

Governing provision

Ten offenses have no limitation — § 4501(a): “Prosecutions for aggravated sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault of a child, sexual assault, sexual exploitation of a minor as defined in subsection 3258(c) of this title, human trafficking, aggravated human trafficking, murder, manslaughter, arson causing death, and kidnapping may be commenced at any time after the commission of the offense.” 

BUT FIVE MORE CARRY A FORTY-YEAR DEADLINE, AND THREE OF THEM ARE CHILD OFFENSES — § 4501(c): “Prosecutions for any of the following offenses shall be commenced within 40 years after the commission of the offense, and not after: (1) lewd and lascivious conduct alleged to have been committed against a child under 18 years of age; (2) maiming; (3) lewd or lascivious conduct with a child; (4) sexual exploitation of children under chapter 64 of this title; and (5) sexual abuse of a vulnerable adult under subsection 1379(b) of this title.” 

Lewd or lascivious conduct with a child is the offense that decides this. Vermont charges non-penetrative childhood sexual abuse under 13 V.S.A. § 2602, lewd or lascivious conduct with a child — and it is in the forty-year list, not the unlimited one. Sexual exploitation of children under chapter 64, which covers the child sexual abuse material offenses, is in the same list. 

Note also that the forty years runs from the commission of the offense, not from the survivor’s eighteenth birthday. A child abused at four is outside the period at forty-four; a child abused at seventeen at fifty-seven. There is no minority tolling anywhere in § 4501. 

Six years for lewd and lascivious conduct against an adult — § 4501(b): lewd and lascivious conduct, sexual abuse of a vulnerable adult under § 1379(a), grand larceny, robbery, burglary, embezzlement, forgery, bribery offenses, false claims, fraud under 33 V.S.A. § 141(d) and felony tax offenses must be commenced within six years. 

Eleven years for arson and first degree aggravated domestic assault — § 4501(d). And the residual — § 4501(e): “Prosecutions for other felonies and for misdemeanors shall be commenced within three years after the commission of the offense, and not after.” 

Why the status is “partly removed”: 13 V.S.A. § 4501(c) lists multiple offenses against children that carry a limitation period. Forty years is generous — it is the longest fixed criminal period in this dataset — but it is a deadline, it runs from the act rather than from majority, and it applies to the offense under which most Vermont childhood contact abuse is charged.

13 V.S.A. § 4501 — Vermont General Assembly, Vermont Statutes Online

The rule — § 522(a): “A civil action brought by any person for recovery of damages for injury suffered as a result of childhood sexual or physical abuse may be commenced at any time after the act alleged to have caused the injury or condition. The victim need not establish which act in a series of continuing physical abuse or sexual abuse or exploitation incidents caused the injury.” 

It covers physical abuse as well as sexual abuse, which is unusual. Section 522(c)(2) defines “childhood physical abuse” as any act other than an attempt against a person under eighteen that would have violated a statute prohibiting aggravated assault. Vermont is the only jurisdiction in this dataset to remove the civil deadline for childhood physical abuse as well as childhood sexual abuse. 

What counts as childhood sexual abuse — § 522(c)(1): any act against a complainant under eighteen that would have constituted a violation of a statute prohibiting lewd and lascivious conduct, lewd or lascivious conduct with a child, felony sexual exploitation of a minor under 13 V.S.A. § 3258(c), sexual assault, or aggravated sexual assault, as in effect when the act was committed. 

A sealing provision that is unique in this dataset — § 522(b): a complaint alleging childhood sexual or physical abuse “shall immediately be sealed by the clerk of the court” and remains sealed until the answer is served or, if a Rule 12(b) motion to dismiss is filed, until the court rules on it. If the complaint is dismissed, the complaint and related papers remain sealed, and any hearing on the motion is held in camera. No other state reviewed protects a claimant’s filing in this way. 

There is no institutional carve-out from the elimination itself. Unlike Utah, Oklahoma, Nebraska, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Tennessee, Vermont does not give institutions a shorter clock — the “at any time” rule in subsection (a) applies to every defendant. The gross negligence requirement in subsections (d) and (e), described in the revival section, applies only to revived claims, not to claims that were still alive.

12 V.S.A. § 522 — Vermont General Assembly, Vermont Statutes Online

The revival — § 522(d): “Notwithstanding 1 V.S.A. § 214, this section shall apply retroactively to childhood sexual abuse that occurred prior to July 1, 2019, irrespective of any statute of limitations in effect at the time the abuse occurred.” Section 214 is Vermont’s general presumption against retroactive effect; subsection (d) displaces it by name. 

And the same for physical abuse — § 522(e): the section applies retroactively to childhood physical abuse occurring before 1 July 2021, again “irrespective of any statute of limitations in effect at the time the abuse occurred.” 

THE PRICE OF REVIVAL IS A HIGHER STANDARD AGAINST INSTITUTIONS — § 522(d), second sentence: “In an action based on childhood sexual abuse that would have been barred by any statute of limitations in effect on June 30, 2019, damages may be awarded against an entity that employed, supervised, or had responsibility for the person allegedly committing the sexual abuse only if there is a finding of gross negligence on the part of the entity.” Subsection (e) imposes the same requirement for physical abuse claims barred as at 30 June 2021. 

So Vermont has two classes of claim against an institution. A claim that was still alive on 30 June 2019 needs only ordinary negligence. A claim that was already dead and is revived by subsection (d) needs gross negligence. The date, not the conduct, decides the standard of proof. 

It has been upheld — A.B. v. S.U., 2023 VT 32 (9 June 2023), held that the retroactive application of the 2019 amendment is constitutional. The Vermont Supreme Court concluded that an expired limitations period does not endow a tortfeasor with a vested right, reasoning that the limitation is a procedural bar on the remedy rather than a substantive right, and that a legislature which created a time limit on a remedy may remove it. 

That places Vermont on the Maryland and North Carolina side of the national split — with Roman Catholic Archbishop of Washington v. Doe (Md. 2025) and McKinney v. Goins (N.C. 2025) — and against Utah (Mitchell v. Roberts), Colorado (Aurora Public Schools v. A.S.), Kentucky (Thompson v. Killary), Maine (Dupuis) and New Hampshire (Ball). A.B. v. S.U. is the earliest of the three decisions on the permissive side and the tracker does not carry it. 

The classification value has been changed from “Window open” to “Permanent revival — no closing date”, because there is nothing to close. This is the same problem identified on the Rhode Island page, where a genuine window sits over a permanent revival, and it applies equally to Nevada, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, all of which the tracker also records as “Window open”. Five jurisdictions are currently described as having something that will end when it will not.

12 V.S.A. § 522(d), (e) — Vermont General Assembly, Vermont Statutes Online 

A.B. v. S.U., No. 22-AP-200 (Vt. 9 June 2023) — full opinion, free