Warning: This article contains descriptions of child sexual abuse and may be distressing.
The 74 reviewed thousands of court filings from every county in New York and found at least 1,973 Child Victims Act (CVA) complaints that explicitly name a school, educator or other school employee as the alleged abuser. Those school‑related complaints amount to nearly one in five of the 10,787 CVA suits filed statewide after the 2019 law created a two‑year lookback window and extended the civil statute of limitations for future claims.
Scope And Key Findings
Among the cases reviewed: 10,787 CVA filings were submitted by 14,592 plaintiffs statewide. Of the school‑linked complaints, 1,003 name public schools, 179 name nonsectarian private schools and 791 name religious institutions, of which 724 implicate Catholic schools. Incidents span decades—some dating to the 1950s—through as recently as 2018.
Geographic patterns vary: school‑related claims account for about 36% of CVA filings in Suffolk County, roughly 40% in the Bronx and an overwhelming 75% in Franklin County. Many suits allege grooming, use of private school spaces to isolate victims, administrative inaction, and a practice known as “passing the trash,” where accused staff quietly move between schools or districts.
Recurring Patterns And Institutional Failures
The complaints commonly describe a multi‑stage process: an adult in authority gains trust (grooming), isolates a child in private spaces (offices, empty classrooms, buses or cars), perpetrates abuse, and then benefits from silence—either through threats, conditions tied to athletic or academic status, or institutions that fail to act decisively.
Attorneys and advocates say many survivors do not report abuse for years or decades. That delay, combined with internal handling of complaints, inadequate historical hiring checks and the absence of public disciplinary records, helped perpetuate abuse and allowed some alleged perpetrators to continue working with children.
Notable Allegations And Settings
Cases range from single accused individuals to alleged serial predators implicated in dozens of suits. Examples discussed in the filings and reporting include:
- Vincent Dutkowski: A coach accused by multiple former students dating to the 1960s; at least five plaintiffs named him in CVA suits.
- Rudy Tremaroli: Named in dozens of complaints tied to one Bronx Catholic school; plaintiffs allege decades of abuse and institutional knowledge.
- Thomas Bernagozzi, Arthur Werner, Vincent Festa: Teachers and staff named in dozens of suits, with some convictions and large district settlements reported.
- Residential Schools and Treatment Centers: Facilities such as Children’s Village, LaSalle School and McQuade Children’s Services appear frequently in complaints alleging endemic abuse of vulnerable youth placed there by courts or social services.
Legal And Policy Gaps Identified
Advocates point to several legal and policy shortcomings in New York that contributed to these outcomes:
- New York does not specifically criminalize “grooming” as a distinct offense.
- The state lacks a clear criminal prohibition on sexual relationships between educators and students above the age of consent, creating protection gaps for older students still enrolled in school.
- Historical hiring practices often relied solely on fingerprinting or incomplete references; many states now require more robust employment screening and former‑employer inquiries.
- Disciplinary records for educators are not readily accessible to the public, limiting transparency.
Impact, Litigation And Reform Pressure
Of the roughly 8,000 CVA cases that progressed beyond initial filing as of February 2026, just under 3,000 had been resolved—leaving about 63% still pending. Lawyers and plaintiffs cite pandemic backlogs, staffing shortages in courts, insurance disputes and complex litigation as reasons for the delays. Civil suits, while slow, are seen by many advocates as a key tool to expose institutional failures and compel reforms.
In response to the wave of CVA litigation, some jurisdictions and institutions have implemented new training, background checks and reporting policies. New York has taken steps—such as permitting longer bonds to help districts finance settlements—but advocates continue to press for criminal laws that explicitly address grooming, stronger hiring standards, mandatory training, public access to disciplinary records and limits on confidentiality clauses that can silence survivors.
Voices Of Survivors
Survivors describing abuse in school settings report long‑term harms—PTSD, depression, substance use, relationship fractures and career impacts. Many said they felt shame, blamed themselves, and only recognized the abuse or felt safe to report decades later. Attorneys emphasize that these experiences reflect patterns of manipulation and betrayal that require systemic fixes.
Resources And Contact
If you are an adult survivor of childhood sexual abuse and wish to share your experience with The 74, contact Amanda Geduld on Signal at ageduld.65. For immediate support, national organizations include RAINN (800‑656‑HOPE), SNAP, After Silence, the Army of Survivors and Enough Abuse.
Disclosure: Amanda Geduld attended Dalton School and her father served on Dalton's board after the tenure of a headmaster named in one complaint; that relationship is noted for transparency in the original reporting.
Coach Vincent Dutkowski (center) with Our Lady of Lourdes High School basketball team, Poughkeepsie, NY, 1966
Vincent Dutkowski was a gym teacher and coach at Our Lady of Lourdes High School in Poughkeepsie in the 1960s.
Survivors of child sexual abuse were in attendance when Gov Andrew Cuomo signed the Child Victims Act into law on Feb. 14, 2019, in the newsroom of the New York Daily News. (Governor's Office)
In 1965, at the time of this Our Lady of Mount Carmel School class photo, Rudy Tremaroli was running a community center that served both the church and the Bronx Catholic school. By the mid-1970s, he had been moved exclusively to the school, according to court documents. (Facebook)
Former Bay Shore elementary school teacher Thomas Bernagozzi (right) with his attorney Steve Politi, in Suffolk County Court on Jan. 20, 2026. (Photo by James Carbone/Newsday RM via Getty Images)
L.J. at a park on Long Island on July 15, 2026, not far from where he said he was sexually abused by his third-grade teacher, Thomas Bernagozzi, in the 1980s. He told The 74 Bernagozzi also abused his older brother. (Eamonn Fitzmaurice/The 74)
The sign outside the 172-year-old LaSalle School in Albany, N.Y. (lasalle-school.org/)
Marci Hamilton , a University of Pennsylvania professor and founder of Child USA, and former Pennsylvania state Rep. Mark Rozzi (behind Hamilton on her left) at a June 13, 2016, rally in support of creating a lookback window for adult survivors of child sexual abuse. Rozzi has said he was sexually abused by a priest when he was 13. Photo by Susan L. Angstadt (Photo By MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images)
Bob Druger, left, around the time he was a senior at Nottingham High School in Syracuse and began working with former Olympian Conrad Mainwaring, right. Mainwaring's role as coach and counselor soon turned into sexual predator, Druger told The 74.
Faith Colson, left, around the time she said she was being sexually abused by her high school physics teacher in Illinois and today when she has become an advocate for survivors of school-based abuse. (Faith Colson)
Conrad Mainwaring in a Massachusetts courtroom in 2024 where he was sentenced to 11 years in prison for abusing young boys at a summer camp in the Berkshires decades earlier. (YouTube)
The plaintiff alleges that while at the family's N.J. beach house she fell asleep late one night on the couch, only to be awakened by Dunnan, lying on top of her and "fondling her breasts." (Credit: J. S. v. Dalton Schools, Inc. et al)
Gardner Dunnan in the 1981 Dalton School yearbook.
