Chapter 11 announced

[ThenNow]

5 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

But until we know one or the other number, "equitable" is just guess work.

Yup. Reading you 5 by 5. 

I think what I'm failing to communicate is that 59,837 men probably should never have been offered an opportunity to file unless there were caveats. I can only really speak for myself, of course. I'm an inadequate Demosthenese warning of the depth of pain that may be coming for many, if turned away or sent away with a token. I understand that may seem out of reach and/or exaggerated. I am just unable to articulate it without getting extremely morose and graphic.

The insurers are coming for every one of those time-barred claims, regardless 60,000, 6000 or 600. That's what I'm saying. I should've known better. Will I take $6100 if that's offered as my "equitable compensation"? I'd be lying if I said I'm going to shred the check. Will it feel like a pat on the head and your aptly dubbed, "I'm sorry" get out of jail card? Yes. In the meantime, am I twisting on a spit? You guys can fill in that answer at this point. 

Oops. Another reference. That was historic, though, so doesn't break my vow. 

[ThenNow]

20 minutes ago, InquisitiveScouter said:

Lol..

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=optomist

I am Pessimist and that's all I need to know how to spell. 

[ThenNow]

I almost said, "I am Pessimist, hear me whine," but resisted the temptation. 

[ParkMan]

1 hour ago, ThenNow said:

Yup. Reading you 5 by 5. 

I think what I'm failing to communicate is that 59,837 men probably should never have been offered an opportunity to file unless there were caveats. I can only really speak for myself, of course. I'm an inadequate Demosthenese warning of the depth of pain that may be coming for many, if turned away or sent away with a token. I understand that may seem out of reach and/or exaggerated. I am just unable to articulate it without getting extremely morose and graphic.

The insurers are coming for every one of those time-barred claims, regardless 60,000, 6000 or 600. That's what I'm saying. I should've known better. Will I take $6100 if that's offered as my "equitable compensation"? I'd be lying if I said I'm going to shred the check. Will it feel like a pat on the head and your aptly dubbed, "I'm sorry" get out of jail card? Yes. In the meantime, am I twisting on a spit? You guys can fill in that answer at this point. 

Oops. Another reference. That was historic, though, so doesn't break my vow. 

Oh - I see now.  You're in the category of people who will not receive insurance payments because you are outside of the SOL window.

You are frustrated because the BSA raised your expectations by saying you should file a claim as part of this bankruptcy process anyways.  If the BSA had not said you should file a claim, you would not have been able to sue and so wouldn't have entered into this otherwise.  I follow now.

[ThenNow]

1 hour ago, ParkMan said:

You're in the category of people who will not receive insurance payments because you are outside of the SOL window.

You are frustrated because the BSA raised your expectations by saying you should file a claim as part of this bankruptcy process anyways.  If the BSA had not said you should file a claim, you would not have been able to sue and so wouldn't have entered into this otherwise.  I follow now.

You're right. I am frustrated, as it's defined. What I feel is very different, but you have no responsibility to relate or empathize. I can't expect that from you or anyone.

With no previous familiarity in bankruptcy, I had no idea there was going to be a distinction between the money sources. I imagine I'm like the many guys who came in independently or through the "mining" process. If that weren't so, we wouldn't have 59,000 time-barred and 24,000 from open and window states, before more winnowing for fraud and whatever. Right? Those who came in with state counsel prep and teed up claims knew what they were doing. Again, I was ignorant and naive, taking the representations at face value. Though trained as a lawyer, emotions of this type are a powerful thing and allowed me to foolishly assume more than I should have. If you ask anyone in the public who's uninitiated, they have no idea there is a difference between money from the BSA, LC's, CO's or insurers. It's all about, "What is the BSA giving survivors of abuse?"   

3 hours ago, CynicalScouter said:

then a settlement or bankruptcy trustee can work backwards to figure out how much each claimant gets.

If you haven't seen something like the doc below and you want to better understand the sexual abuse claim assessment and valuation process, check it out. Even if there is winnowing for fraud, unethical behavior, insufficiency of identifying data, and etc., or the application of a time-bar should any of that happen prior to the Settlement Trust, the process of assessing claims remains. I assume the metric in this case will be somewhat similar, but that's nothing more than a guess. 

Edited March 8, 2021 by ThenNow
Error

[ThenNow]

Opps. I guess this was deleted. 

1804815587_RCCofNewMexicoClaimPointsSys.pdf

[5thGenTexan]

10 hours ago, CynicalScouter said:

Three MAJOR caveats here:

1) What gets reported on the IRS 990s is often assets MINUS depreciation.

2) There's shell games getting played. So yes, XYZ Council doesn't list Camp on their IRS 990s. That's because they shifted it to some Trust and the Council leases it for $1 a year (looking at you Middle Tennessee Council).

3) Council "Foundations". LCs can and will absolutely bury the $$$ in those and pretend they don't control it when, for all intents and purposes, they do.

Not to pick on Circle Ten, but they are an example.

Circle Ten Boy Scouts Foundation EIN # 75-6026210 has over $50 million in 990 reported assets.

Meanwhile the Council EIN #75-0800615 itself has "only" $35 million in 990 reported assets.

 

One of C10 camps is for whatever reason is incorporated.

https://nonprofitlight.com/tx/dallas/camp-wisdom-inc

Two of the camps are fairly easily identifiable on tax maps.

Another is weird.  The property the ranger's resident sits on is listed.  The camp itself is on Corps of Engineer property, so that will stay with the US Govt.  But, cant find anything on the personal property on the land.

[fred8033]

10 hours ago, ThenNow said:

...  59,837 men probably should never have been offered an opportunity to file unless there were caveats. ...

Wow.  I thought I wouldn't be surprised anymore by this.  

But then again, this only re-enforces lawyer jokes.   Does the profession ever discipline abuse like this?  It's either malpractice or ambulance chasing.  In either case, it only further damages those asserted as victims already.

[DavidLeeLambert]

On 3/8/2021 at 12:02 AM, fred8033 said:

It will never happen.  BSA and Catholic church were perfect targets.  Massive targets with deep cash.  BSA even provided tracking records from their attempt to block bad volunteers.   Government agencies, youth and sport, parks and rec are usually city sized.  Just not big enough for a national class action campaign looking back 50 years. 

For someone who actually looks, the Ineligible Volunteer Files already have cases where look-back liability could just as well be assigned to a local government entity. See for example  https://documents.latimes.com/paul-j-wadaga/ (elementary school teacher for 24 years, molested at least 18 boys, was an ASM for 4 years of that but the Council asked around and didn't find any Scouts among his victims), https://documents.latimes.com/michael-c-spangler/ (assistant fire chief), and https://documents.latimes.com/eric-frank-feichtinger/ (police officer in a Child Sexual Abuse investigation unit).

I don't think local government liability will be a significant factor in halting the trend to longer or weaker Statutes of Limitation.  Nor will massive liability against the LDS church or against Catholic dioceses. Enough people are distrustful of government, and enough people consider those churches "the other".

On the other hand, when the Methodist church on Main Street in every small town has to liquidate because it once chartered a Scout unit, some other unit in the Council had multiple cases of abuse, and every other related organization is bankrupt, defunct or has immunity, there may be more general political will to reintroduce or re-strengthen Statutes of Limitation. Unfortunately, if it gets to that point, it may be too late for BSA or the Local Councils.

[ThenNow]

4 hours ago, fred8033 said:

I thought I wouldn't be surprised anymore by this.  

I may misunderstand how this is going to work (ya think?), but it seems ParkMan implied the BSA would pay each man regardless of time-bar. I take that from his statement, "...you are not in the category of people who will receive insurance payments." This could be me reading between the lines, again, which has proven a bad idea. I will ask someone who may know.

Yeah. The number is huge. If, however, everyone will get something from the BSA, with $6100 as a baseline, some men will be very grateful. I think of the guys in prison, jobless, in need of medical care, and, etc. 

Edited March 9, 2021 by ThenNow

[Eagle1993]

My understanding is that in 1978 and prior, BSA had its HQ in New York and New Jersey.  Both states have updated their SOL. So, for any abuse nationally, 1978 and prior, lawsuits against National could pursue. Post 1978 it would likely then go per state law.   Now there are 30+ states with their own SOL changes.  

Now the question is, since BSA is declaring bankruptcy, did they give up the right to defend against abuse after 1978 and outside the current state’s SOL?  Is that the 57,000 reference?
 

 

[Eagle1993]

57 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

On the other hand, when the Methodist church on Main Street in every small town has to liquidate because it once chartered a Scout unit, some other unit in the Council had multiple cases of abuse, and every other related organization is bankrupt, defunct or has immunity, there may be more general political will to reintroduce or re-strengthen Statutes of Limitation.

I think that depends.  If it’s due to people in their 20s and 30s coming out and the perps are still employed by the Methodist Church most would say let them go bankrupt.  If the perps are dead and the victims are in their 50s+ I tend to agree there would be SOL pushback. 
 

IMHO, I don’t agree there should be no SOL but at the same time, 21 seems far too young.  If you were raped at 11 it may take until your 30s to really seek justice and that should be allowed. It may take longer but there is a trade off at some point.  21 seems too early. 50 seems to late. 

[ThenNow]

17 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

Is that the 57,000 reference?

The number includes claims that would have been barred against civil suit in state court on 2.18.2020. Those were the non-starter cases for which the Chapter 11 was the court of last resort, unless/until SoL reform happened in the given state. No SoL's have changed, to my knowledge, over the past year so that would be the same today. As claims are logged, they flag the abuse dates, how much time has passed and the applicable SoL in the state(s) of abuse. That's my understanding how the number is derived.

[ThenNow]

18 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

If you were raped at 11 it may take until your 30s to really seek justice and that should be allowed.

My first abuse was on my 11th birthday. The last just just before turning 17. I woke up to it all when I was 42. At the time, other boys/men in our Troop who had been abused by the same SM were identified by the Sheriff's Dept. lead investigator . They were in their 30's, but unwilling to talk about it much beyond acknowledgement and refused to prosecute. Not ready to countenance the whole experience and repercussions of coming forward. They could have initiated, as not time-barred, but they couldn't bring themselves to act. I understood.

[DuctTape]

The SOL for criminality should not exist. Obviously we cannot open that to past cases, but the SOL for the criminal behavior of abuse  should be eliminated from this day forward.