Chapter 11 announced

[CynicalScouter]

21 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

Then again, all of those people are older than me, many are probably deceased, and some may themselves have been victims.

Part of the problem is this: those people are not being sued. This is a suit against the corporate entity called Boy Scouts of America.

If this was a lawsuit/bankruptcy against say XYZ Corp. that makes widgets, the people who lose out there are shareholders and other unsecured creditors. If the widgets were defective or harmed people, the worst case scenario is XYZ Corp goes bankrupt, the shareholders and unsecured creditors are up a creek without a paddle, and the secured and other creditors get to pick at the carcass. The CEO and other executives of XYZ corp would have no personal liability, and neither would be other people who bought XYZ Corp widgets.

This is the problem with trying to keep a charity/not-for-profit running post bankruptcy. If the organization does good, the court is NOT going to want to outright kill it. But the fact is that Boy Scouts of America is an incorporated entity, which means that it "owns" the liability, especially since states repealed, relaxed, or opened up their statute of limitations on abuse.

 

 

[John-in-KC]

A few years back, I talked to Western Los Angeles Council (once the San Fernando Valley Council, the council of my youth)) about record retention.  To say that files from 30 years ago are long gone is an understatement.  Finding youth and adults from the Boomer and much of the Gen X era is a pipe dream. 

Edited July 17, 2020 by John-in-KC

[David CO]

30 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

 

But there's a long list of people who presumably benefited from the pre-YPT program more directly than I did, and more than my kids will, and it seems like they should be paying something toward any settlement, even though there's probably no actual legal way to pass the liability on to them now:

 

We paid for insurance.  The insurance premiums were supposed to pay for any settlements.  As it turns out, the insurance policies were worthless.  The insurance companies collected the premiums for many years, but now they won't pay out.  The obvious solution is for the courts to make the insurance companies pay for the settlements.

 

[CynicalScouter]

7 minutes ago, David CO said:

We paid for insurance.  The insurance premiums were supposed to pay for any settlements.  As it turns out, the insurance policies were worthless.  The insurance companies collected the premiums for many years, but now they won't pay out.  The obvious solution is for the courts to make the insurance companies pay for the settlements.

Two reasons:

1) Some of the policies covered accidents. This was not an accident.

2) The policies were based on Boy Scouts NOT withholding information from the insurance companies. The Insurance companies are claiming, in effect, that Boy Scouts failed to fully disclose therefore the insurance agreements are void.

 

Quote

 

Insurers Balk

It’s also in court with its insurance companies, which argue that they shouldn’t have to pay claims related to abuse that the Scouts could have reasonably prevented. BSA and several councils sued the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Co. and First State Insurance Co. in Texas for $13.5 million in June, after the insurers argued that BSA’s own records showed the organization hadn’t done enough to warn or protect kids. These weren’t unrelated incidents, according to the insurers, but all the result of the organization’s failure to warn parents of the risk.

 

In a different legal dispute, insurers are refusing to pay for sex-abuse settlements and legal defense fees, arguing that the events weren’t accidents, or even unforeseen.

“We have a social and moral responsibility to fairly compensate victims who suffered abuse during their time in Scouting, and we also have an obligation to carry out our mission to serve youth, families and local communities,” Surbaugh said in his statement. “At no time in our history have we knowingly allowed a sexual predator to work with youth, and we always seek to act swiftly when alerted to abuse allegations.”

 

 

Edited July 17, 2020 by CynicalScouter

[David CO]

17 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

Two reasons:

1) Some of the policies covered accidents. This was not an accident.

2) The policies were based on Boy Scouts NOT withholding information from the insurance companies. The Insurance companies are claiming, in effect, that Boy Scouts failed to fully disclose therefore the insurance agreements are void.

 

 

I know that this is what they are arguing.  I also know that they will probably get away with it.  But that doesn't mean it is true.  If the pedophile problem was a secret, then it was a very open secret.  Everybody knew.

It sounds a lot like the war crimes trials.  Everybody claimed they didn't know.  It happened right in front of their faces, but everyone denied having seen it.

[CynicalScouter]

10 minutes ago, David CO said:

I know that this is what they are arguing.  I also know that they will probably get away with it.  But that doesn't mean it is true.  If the pedophile problem was a secret, then it was a very open secret.  Everybody knew.

It sounds a lot like the war crimes trials.  Everybody claimed they didn't know.  It happened right in front of their faces, but everyone denied having seen it.

Here's a copy of National's lawsuit against the insurance companies. Note the timeframe: the policies date to the 1970s.

You seem to be under the impression that the premiums were paid "for years". That isn't how this worked. National signed insurance agreements with them EACH YEAR. So this isn't "years of premiums". The question is, for example, in 1971 did National sign the insurance agreement for that year and nevertheless withhold info?
The insurance companies are claiming (rightly probably) that National knew but did NOT tell the insurance companies when the policies were signed back then.

And given National's action/reaction, I fully believe they knew and opted NOT to tell the insurance companies in 1970s.

 

 

PLAINTIFFS’ ORIGINAL PETITION.pdf

 

Edited July 17, 2020 by CynicalScouter

[David CO]

47 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

 

And given National's action/reaction, I fully believe they knew and opted NOT to tell the insurance companies in 1970s.      

               

I have no doubt that the executives lied.  They still lie.  They lie all the time.  Regardless of what the executives did or did not tell the insurance companies, the insurance companies knew about it.  They always knew about it.  Everyone knew.

Even though the money is important, it is even more important that the insurance companies be made to acknowledge that they knew about it.  It is infuriating that people are still insisting that they didn't know.  Everyone knew.

I think the victims want the truth to come out.  People knew it was happening, and yet they still allowed it to happen.  That is the real story here.

Edited July 17, 2020 by David CO

[CynicalScouter]

2 minutes ago, David CO said:

I have no doubt that the executives lied.  They still lie.  They lie all the time.  Regardless of what the executives did or did not tell the insurance companies, the insurance companies knew about it.  They always knew about it.  Everyone knew.

Even though the money is important, it is even more important that the insurance companies be made to acknowledge that they knew about it.  It is infuriating that people are still insisting that they didn't know.  Everyone knew.

How would the insurance companies have know if Scouts National leaders were lying to the insurance companies? You can say "everyone knew" but looking back we now know: no, not "everyone knew".

[Eagle1993]

The other option BSA is to fight in court for several years.  The Archdiocese of Milwaukee did that (4 years) and was able to settle 330 cases for $21M ($64K per).  575 actually filed (so that $36.5K per filing).  For BSA that would be close to $365M for 10,000.  Sell of the paintings and cut staff … they can get there.  

FYI ... the attorney against MKE Archdiocese was the same one suing BSA.  So he will know that organizations can and are willing to fight back hard.  Given that, hopefully he is more reasonable in settlement talks.

https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-archdiocese-settlement-20150805-story.html

 

[fred8033]

5 hours ago, CynicalScouter said:

And given National's action/reaction, I fully believe they knew and opted NOT to tell the insurance companies in 1970s.

This may be a naive question.  BUT, what would BSA have told insurance companies?  The laws did not exist then as they do now.   Not liability laws.  Not abuse laws.  Absolutely not reporting laws. 

Also, what would BSA communicate?  We had an issue with person X where parents, police, church leaders and others did not want to pursue the case?  Also, how would they have pursued it?  Our independent franchisee Council Y had an incident and we want to report it up?  Our independent franchisee Council Y "charter partner" (church XXX) had trouble with one of the leaders that church selected as a youth leader?  

Also, I've had insurance policies over the years, business and personal.  I'm an amateur, but I never remember an insurance reporting form where there was not a claim.  Now, the claims are coming.  

Also, I'd argue insurance companies must have known that youth serving organizations tend to have issues like this.  I'm sure they were not that naive. 

It seems like noise to say BSA did not let insurance companies know.  Expectations are based on the time and place.  Lawsuits are based on very different expectations now.  

The real issue is a 1970s insurance policy could never have conceived of the liability now being applied.  I doubt anyone could have conceived of what is happening now with these lawsuits. 

The real issue here is BSA is a single-source with deep pockets ... or somewhat deep.  Will the lawsuits now start being applied to every police department, church and independent person listed in these reports?  I doubt it, because that would be too much work.  But it could be farmed out to smaller law offices as a strong arm tactic to extort money.

Edited July 18, 2020 by fred8033

[CynicalScouter]

32 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

BUT, what would BSA have told insurance companies

"We have files full of people we bounced out due to child abuse/pedophilia."

Had they admitted and specified, rather than hid, the insurance premiums would have been higher.

[David CO]

32 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

 

The real issue is a 1970s insurance policy could never have conceived of the liability now being applied.  I doubt anyone could have conceived of what is happening now with these lawsuits. 

 

We had a statute of limitations.  Nobody expected that 30 year old cases would come back to haunt them.  

[5thGenTexan]

7 hours ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

As an adult member and former boy member, I won't completely rule out contributing to the victim compensation fund, one way or another. But it will really hang a weight around recruitment and retention.

BSA's own internal review identified 12,254 victims in the Ineligble Volunteer Files (cited in a Washigton Post article). MSU's settlement in the Larry Nassar case was a little over $1.5 million per victim. Back in 2007, the Diocese of Los Angeles settled with over 500 alleged victims for about $1.3 million per victim. So that could add up to (very roughly) $18 billion for a "market rate" total settlement fund.  Divide that by the number of currently active Scouts, and it's $8,788 settlement share per current youth member.  The BSA assets in complete liquidation wouldn't even be "10 cents on the dollar", more like 5 or 6 cents.

Since I have four kids in Scouting, that would be over $35,000 I'd have to pay off over the next 2 to 12 years to keep them in the program... less than my yearly salary, but enough for a decent new car, or a few really nice vacations, or a major home renovation, or one kid's tuition and room and board for a year at MSU, or all the kids' tuition for each to get an associate's degree at a community college.

But there's a long list of people who presumably benefited from the pre-YPT program more directly than I did, and more than my kids will, and it seems like they should be paying something toward any settlement, even though there's probably no actual legal way to pass the liability on to them now:

• Anyone who earned Eagle before 1989
• Anyone who was a professional Council or National Council employee before 1989
• Anyone who served on any level Committee (unit, district, council, national) before 1989
• Any parent who saved money that otherwise would have been spent on babysitters or fees to another youth organization's camps, by sending his or her boy to Scout Camp, before 1989
• Any boy who learned something from Scouting, or had a great time while participating, before 1989
• Any organization or community member who accepted volunteer labor from Scouts, before 1989
• And of course the Scoutmasters and other volunteers who actually committed or covered up the abuse

Then again, all of those people are older than me, many are probably deceased, and some may themselves have been victims.

I am not sure if you are trying to be funny or serious here.  I am also not sure how long ago you think the 80s were.

My parents were both leaders when I was a Cub Scout in the early to mid 80s.  They are both still living and I am not sure why they need the issues of the BSA passed on to them.

I was a Cub Scout and Boy Scout in the early to mid 80s and I am fairly certain I am still living.  I am a leader now.  I can't in any way see why the buck should be passed on to me based on my involvement in the organization.

[David CO]

54 minutes ago, 5thGenTexan said:

I can't in any way see why the buck should be passed on to me based on my involvement in the organization.

I think everybody, regardless of age or generation, is feeling this way right now.  Why me?

The answer to that question is really very simple.  Participation in scouting is voluntary.  We have 1 year registrations.  We have no obligations before or after that 1 year.  None at all.  And nobody has to sign up.  The only people who will have to pay up are those who sign up.  And they will only have to pay during the year they sign up.  That's it.  Nothing more.

Why me?  Because you continue to sign up.  That's why.  No other reason.  Your choice.  Your $$$.

[fred8033]

7 hours ago, David CO said:

Everyone knew.

Absolutely.  People might have not known the extent or the specific individuals, but people knew these things happen.  With specific incidents, I'd be interested how many involved only the BSA paid staff.  I'm betting with almost every case, there were outside individuals who knew.