The Boy Scouts of America have agreed to what will be the largest monetary settlement child sexual abuse case in history.
Tens of thousands of people who say they were sexually abused while scouts and filed suit against the Boy Scouts of America have reached an $850 million settlement, the largest in a child sexual abuse case in United States history.
More than 84,000 people are part of the lawsuit against the 110-year-old organization, which has been plagued with claims of abuse from volunteers and leaders since the 1960s. The Boy Scouts of America filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year as it faced mounting legal costs to defend itself against claims of sexual abuse against boys.
Ken Rothweiler, an attorney at Eisenberg Rothweiler in Philadelphia who represents the largest group of claimants — more than 16,800 people — says that this settlement is a start. The insurance rights for the past 40 years will be put into a trust that the survivor’s group will control and that could amount to billions more for the victims.
“I am pleased that both the BSA and their local councils have stepped up to be the first to compensate the survivors,” Rothweiler said in a statement Thursday. “We will now negotiate with the insurers and sponsoring and chartering organizations who have billions of dollars in legal exposure, of which a substantial portion is necessary to fairly compensate the survivors.”
Rothweiler says the majority of his clients are in their 60s and 70s and the abuse happened while they were in their teens.
“As a former Boy Scout who is a sexual abuse survivor, I am gratified that the Boy Scouts are taking responsibility for the sexual abuse that occurred to me and others that we have had to live with for decades,” one victim who is 65 and lives in the New York area said. “This acknowledgment by the Boy Scouts will start the process of healing for many of us who have suffered.”
The settlement was detailed in court documents filed Thursday.
The Boy Scouts called the settlement a significant step.
Note this quote:
Know who those sponsoring and chartering organizations are? Thousands of local church congregations, VFW’s and other civic organizations. Thousands. All of whom Scouts BSA has now tossed under the bus. Many will not be able to withstand any sort of punitive judgement as they have few assets besides their buildings and their often free programs.
This could get very ugly very quickly.
The Mormons are particularly on the hook, as IIRC they pretty much mandate Scouting for their youth.
Which doesn’t give LDS members a great reputation among Scouts. People forced to be in a group tend to be…disruptive, compared to those who wanted to be there.
This part of a devastating pattern of failings by institutions which should form the foundation of a civil society, but which show themselves to be unworthy of trust or respect.
Churches, universities, businesses, civic organizations- all these separate power centers of civic life that political theorists talk about are crumbling.
It isn’t true that sexual abuse is the only cause, but it is one of the most obvious and visible signs that these institutions lack the high ground of authority to guide and inform our culture.
Somehow the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops didn’t get that memo.
Specifically what are you referring to and when?
There aren’t many replacements for these institutions either. So we have the situation where everything that forms the basis of civil society is failing but nothing is coming about to replace it or the replacements like Internet forums can’t do as much and have their own problems like radicalization.
What’s the old saw about absolute power and corruption?