Not reporting abuse to the police, a school, or anyone else does not, by itself, end your legal options in California. A civil lawsuit is separate from any criminal case, and it does not require a prior report. Whether a claim is still open depends on when the abuse happened, your age at the time, and who may be responsible.
California civil law was written with silence in mind, and many of its deadlines were extended precisely because so many survivors do not speak about abuse for years, or decades.
Not Reporting Does Not Close Your Legal Options
California has two separate legal tracks for sexual abuse. A criminal case is brought by the state, through a prosecutor, to punish the person who committed the abuse. A civil claim (a lawsuit a survivor brings in their own name to seek damages for the harm done) belongs to the survivor. The two tracks run independently.
A civil claim does not depend on a police report. California's civil sexual assault statute says so directly: it is not necessary that a criminal prosecution or other proceeding have been brought, and if one was brought, it did not need to end in a conviction. No police report, school complaint, or internal report to a church or youth organization is a precondition to a civil case.
The differences between the two systems are covered in our guide to civil vs. criminal abuse cases.
Why So Many Survivors Never Report: A Documented Reality
Not reporting is the common experience, not the exception, and none of the reasons reflects a failure by the survivor.
- Fear of not being believed, especially when the person who caused harm was respected.
- The relationship to the abuser. Abuse is most often committed by someone known and trusted: a family member, coach, teacher, member of the clergy, or another adult in authority.
- Threats against the survivor or the people they love.
- Shame and self-blame, which are effects of the harm, not evidence of fault.
- Institutional pressure. Institutions have at times discouraged reports, handled them internally, or moved the person accused rather than acting.
- Not recognizing it as abuse at the time.
- Age. Children often lack the words, understanding or safe adult needed to tell anyone.
California's Civil Statutes of Limitations for Abuse Survivors
A statute of limitations is the deadline for filing a lawsuit. California's deadlines depend on whether the survivor was a child or an adult, and on when the abuse happened. See our guide to the California abuse statute of limitations.
Childhood sexual assault: Code of Civil Procedure § 340.1
For abuse before age 18, the governing statute is Code of Civil Procedure § 340.1. Its current text begins:
"There is no time limit for the commencement of any of the following actions for recovery of damages suffered as a result of childhood sexual assault."
That no-time-limit rule applies only to abuse that occurred on or after January 1, 2024. It did not revive older claims. For abuse that occurred on or before December 31, 2023, the earlier rule still controls: a survivor may file until age 40, or within five years of discovering that a psychological injury was caused by the abuse, whichever is later. A separate three-year revival window for older childhood claims closed on December 31, 2022.
The five-year discovery period runs from when a survivor connects their injury to the abuse, not from when the abuse happened. A survivor who is 40 or older when filing a childhood claim must also file certificates of merit, signed by the attorney and by a licensed mental health practitioner.
Section 340.1 covers claims against the person who committed the abuse and against any person or entity whose negligent or intentional act was a legal cause of it, which is how claims reach schools, churches, youth organizations and other institutions.
Adult sexual assault: Code of Civil Procedure § 340.16
For sexual assault on or after the survivor's 18th birthday, the statute is Code of Civil Procedure § 340.16. The general deadline is the later of 10 years from the last act of assault, or three years from when the survivor discovers, or reasonably should have discovered, that an injury resulted from it.
There is also a revival window, created by AB 2777 (Stats. 2022, Ch. 442). Under § 340.16(b)(3), an adult assault claim based on conduct on or after January 1, 2009, that would otherwise be barred only because the deadline expired may be filed until December 31, 2026. The window does not revive a claim that was litigated to finality, or settled in a written agreement, before January 1, 2023. Two older windows in the same statute, tied to specific university physicians, closed in 2020 and 2021.
The criminal deadline is a separate question
A criminal deadline passing does not close a civil claim, and a civil deadline passing does not affect whether prosecutors can act.
Claims against public entities
When the defendant is a public entity, such as a public school district or a county agency, California's Government Claims Act may add a step: presenting a written claim to the entity before suing. Under Government Code § 911.2, a claim for personal injury generally must be presented within six months after the cause of action accrues.
For childhood sexual assault claims under § 340.1, California law exempts survivors from that claim-presentation step when the defendant is a local public entity, such as a school district, and a local entity cannot substitute its own procedure. Claims against the State of California follow different rules, and the exemption there reaches conduct on or after January 1, 2024. For adult assault claims against a public entity, the claim-presentation requirement may still apply. Our guide to school sexual abuse claims discusses public schools in more detail.
General procedural information is available from the California Courts Self-Help Guide and the main California Courts website.