Yesterday, the Texas Senate State Affairs Committee unanimously voted for SB-835, also known as “Trey’s Law,” adopting the preferred language of witnesses in favor of the bill.
The hearing included two versions of “Trey’s Law” — the Senate version focused solely on survivors of childhood crimes and the House companion bill, HB-748, that would apply to sexual assault and trafficking victims of any age. Both the invited and public testimony overwhelmingly supported language that would apply to all sexual assault and trafficking victims.
These now identical public safety bills seek to end the misuse of nondisclosure agreements against sexual assault victims in civil settlement agreements.
“Trey’s Law” is named after Trey Carlock, a Dallas native who sued Kanakuk Kamps after enduring a decade of child sexual abuse by popular camp director Pete Newman. His civil case was settled and included a restrictive NDA that family members say led to his death of despair in 2019. Carlock’s older sister, Elizabeth Carlock Phillips, testified in support of the bill last week.
“Sadly, a lot of truth dies with people because of NDAs.”
“Sadly, a lot of truth dies with people because of NDAs. That only protects bad actors, which is contrary to public interest,” Phillips testified last Thursday at the Texas Senate committee hearing. “To me, that’s the point of Trey’s Law and this hearing today — public safety, protecting children, prioritizing life, liberty, and the pursuit of healing and happiness.”
HB-748 is still pending in committee. But following this recent unanimous vote, SB-835 now awaits a Senate floor vote before it would be sent to the House.
The unanimous vote on SB-835 follows testimony by Phillips and numerous other survivors, advocates and subject matter experts, including victims of child sexual abuse at Kanakuk, Boy Scouts, Assemblies of God and in other contexts.
Cindy Clemishire
Cindy Clemishire, whose abuser Robert Morris made his first appearance in court on Friday for child sex abuse charges, also testified in support of Trey’s Law.
“Because I refused to sign that NDA at 37, I am able to sit here today at 55 years old and share my story in hopes of helping others,” Clemishire testified on Thursday, the day before Morris’ first court appearance for a preliminary hearing.
During a second set of testimony, former Boy Scout Curtis Garrison, who was abused by his scoutmaster in the 1980s, shared how his storytelling has made huge impacts. Because he never signed an NDA, Garrison was able to participate in litigation that helped take down the Boy Scouts of America when his abuser was publicly identified as a perpetrator in 2010.
Passing Trey’s law, he explained, would take tremendous power away from abusive institutions and bad actors within them.
Criticizing the BSA and Kanakuk for using NDAs to silence survivors, he rhetorically asked committee members, “Where is Roger Krone and Glen Pounder from the BSA? Where is Joe White after Kanakuk tried to justify the use of NDAs? They should be here if they really care about children.”
“Texas needs to pass Trey’s law and protect children, not predators,” he asserted.
Pete Newman survivor Ashton Alarcon, a captain in the U.S. Air Force currently stationed in Japan, also testified in favor of the bill. He was able to fly home just for the hearing. He was 14 years old when he asked his father not to sign an NDA.
“I wasn’t able to keep my purity. … But I was able to keep my voice.”
“I can’t explain it at the time, but I knew the impact it would have, that there would be some good to come out of this if I was able to keep my voice,” he said. “I wasn’t able to keep my purity. I was unable to keep my sanity at the time. But I was able to keep my voice.”
Earlier in the day, his father testified to the committee, explaining the harsh legal intimidation tactics Kanakuk took against the family for refusing to sign away Ashton’s story. During his afternoon testimony, Alarcon emphasized the benefits of being able to keep his voice, saying. “Governments should protect individual freedoms and human dignity.”
He also offered six reasons why having his voice has been important:
- Emotional processing
- Feeling seen, heard and validated
- Reducing shame and self-stigmas
- Gaining perspective and meaning
- Empowerment and reclaiming agency
- Communication and connection
Poignantly, Alarcon told the committee these benefits have contributed to his Christian faith journey as a “conqueror” of abuse.
“Shame thrives in secrecy,” Alarcon said. “Sharing breaks the silence. It dissolves the lie that I am alone and transforms pain into power. Although names like ‘victim’ and ‘survivor’ … in situations like this are used to identify me in settings, they imply a negative. However, telling my story has given me time to reclaim my identity. Especially my identity in Christ. I am a conqueror, not a survivor.
“Sharing my story gives me the narrative power,” Alarcon explained. “Trauma often involves a loss of control, and telling my story is an act of regaining ownership over my life.”
“Telling my story is an act of regaining ownership over my life.”
And that control helped him serve and empower others during a mission trip to Hungary he took just after graduating from high school.
“On the last day, I felt the Holy Spirit ask me to share my story. I told him no, that I was upset with him, and that if he wanted me to tell my story, someone was going to have to come and ask me.” And shortly afterward, a leader approached him to share his testimony with the faith community they were working with.
“Little did I know the impact that would have until the next day,” he said. The community, unbeknownst to him, had been suffering from “generations of abuse” that was ill addressed. His testimony seemed to empower community members to feel like they no longer were alone and began telling their own stories.
“When I got up and told my story, he said that never has this church been filled with people asking for healing, speaking out that had never [been] shared with anybody. They had not seen anybody who has come forward about this, has healed from abuse like this, and speak with such power and authority. It was foreign to them,” Alarcon explained. “This is something I need to share with others. Others need to know they are not alone.”
And urging the committee to support the bill, he compared his service to the country to their legislative duty: “As I fight to protect our freedom, please fight for my voice.”
And at the end of his testimony, Alarcon cited the opening verses of Habakkuk:
O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen?
Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save?
Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble?
Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise.
So the law becomes slack, and justice never prevails.
The wicked surround the righteous; therefore judgment comes forth perverted.
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