Chapter 11 announced - Part 3 - BSA's Toggle Plan

[CynicalScouter]

 

42 minutes ago, T2Eagle said:

As I type this, it also occurs to me that if the LCs are not part of the final resolution what does that do to the claimant pool?  A claimant from a non look back state doesn't really have a legally cognizable claim against BSA, would they even retain their right to vote on a plan that is BSA national only?

Maybe? The point is that BSA is asking you to give up any claim you have today OR MAY HAVE IN THE FUTURE regarding your sexual abuse. So, even if NOW, TODAY you have no actionable claim (no SoL lookback) someday, you may. If this plan closes the door on ANY claim against BSA, now (Sol lookback states) or in the future (state legislature approves a SoL lookback), you get a vote.

At least, that is how I read it.

[DavidLeeLambert]

16 hours ago, ThenNow said:

see no indication that there was a confrontation of any kind. Not noted in the police report, filed by the parents with a statement from the Scout. I'm now jaded by the "deletion" and wouldn't be at all surprised if it was a backdated resignation. I hear your point and it's valid. Neither of us know for sure.

I'll agree with @fred1983that "deletion" was probably a term of art, meaning "remove the person from the active roster". I don't think it generally meant "pretend that this person never existed", any more than it meant "sneak into his home at night and euthanize him".

Likewise old IVFs and other documents relating to CSA from that era might mention "indecent liberties", or "morals offenses", or "social disease". Since those are not the preferred terms for the offensive conduct today, it's tempting to claim that the people who created the records were trying to perpetrate a cover-up by being ambiguous; but those were valid descriptive terms for the conduct at the time.

One thing that does bother me (and I don't know whether you've seen it in the IVFs from your own council, contemporaneous with your abuse) is that sometimes the council refunded an IV's current-year registration fee, $.50, or $1.00, or whatever. I would have thought conduct sufficient to deny registration would have been just cause to forfeit the fee!

But I can think of several non-conspiratorial explanations for why IVFs are often missing some documents that may have existed at one point. For example:

• The office at the National Council that kept them was trying to save space, and only kept the minimum documentation necessary to legally justify registration denial.
• Local Council personnel were busy (managing thousands of non-ineligible youth and adult registrations, and badge and advancement records), and didn't always have reliable Xerox machines or mimeograph machines, so just sent in the minimum documentation they could write, retype or clip from a newspaper.
• Entire pages were excluded from the files by the protective order that released them.

 

[ThenNow]

3 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

I was just curious how far the police went.  Interviews?  a real report being filed?  Anyone arrested?  etc, etc.  

Yes. Yes. No. Can't answer etceteras. 

 

3 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

If police were pulled in, the police are working with the victims and it's outside scouting control.  I'm betting it was dropped for the same many reasons many cases were dropped.  Not taking it seriously enough.

Yes, but "Scouting" was still in contact with the parents. Feel free to wager. You don't think there's a very real possibility they were asked to stand down and let the BSA deal with it? Really? It was taken seriously if there was an incident report and a jacket created. I can check the law at the time, but I have no idea why you would assume the "right laws" were not in place. Yes, as I said, I'm sure the family didn't want ABMSL ("ABUSED BY MY SCOUT LEADER") tattooed on their 11 year old's forehead. I get it 100% and said so. My dad would've killed him and ended it...and gone to prison destroying our family. I feel you keep dumping off the BSA liability and that's fine. Have at in a buy a donut, coffee and hold a klatch to chew on it. Back to the sociological, cultural and philosophical discussion, which I'm happy to have. 

[CynicalScouter]

12 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

A key point is deep pockets.  Having each LC handle their own breaks up the incentive of deep pockets.  Let the cases be handled on their merits and even be grouped at the council level. 

The counter argument is what is called "Race for the courthouse door". First abuse victim/case that goes to verdict/settles gets paid out. But the second? Third?

Any BSA plan that does NOT include LCs results in at least two dozen councils going into their own Chapter 11s the day that BSA's plan is given final approval.

Thus we could have a "partial" toggle? A plan that a) covers BSA and b) covers participating councils but c) allows the other LCs to go it alone.

[Eagle1993]

32 minutes ago, T2Eagle said:

A claimant from a non look back state doesn't really have a legally cognizable claim against BSA, would they even retain their right to vote on a plan that is BSA national only?

One of the reasons National BSA has all these claims, is that they had New York as their HQ for a long time, followed by New Jersey as their HQ.   That went all the way until 1979.  So to me, the state laws apply to national allow lookback windows.  So 100% of claims from 1979 and prior are within state laws of New York/New Jersey.

My question is with National HQ in Texas and 1980 and later.  How are those claims valid?  Some would definitely be valid based on Texas SOLs, but I'm curious how the claims in 1980s and most of the 1990s could be valid when National HQ is in Texas.

[ThenNow]

1 minute ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

I don't think it generally meant "pretend that this person never existed", any more than it meant "sneak into his home at night and euthanize him".

I appreciate both of you letting me know that. Duly noted. Regardless, as I said -- once buried in the haystack rant and the other more clearly stated -- my issue is not with that case, but what I learned about my case from it.

[CynicalScouter]

8 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

My question is with National HQ in Texas and 1980 and later.  How are those claims valid?

AT THE TIME OF THE ABUSE, National HQ was in New York? NY law applies.

AT THE TIME OF THE ABUSE, National HQ was in New Jersey? NJ law applies.

Etc.

There's also an argument that place of incorporation doesn't matter.

1) Boy Scouts of America (HQ) was registered as a not for profit operating in the state? That grants jurisdiction. And many states require that if you operate at charity/not for profit in the state, you register as a "foreign" not for profit annually.

For example, BSA has registered with the South Dakota Secretary of State since at least 2006.

2) Boy Scouts of America (HQ) was operating through officers, agents, and employees in that state. You do business in that state, you are subject to its jurisdiction. Doesn't matter if Ford Motor is HQ is in Detroit; a Virginia court will exercise jurisdiction if Ford was doing business in the state. This is called "Long arm" jurisdiction.

FN010948.pdf

Edited May 11, 2021 by CynicalScouter

[DavidLeeLambert]

14 minutes ago, ThenNow said:

Not sure what you mean. LC's aren't voting on the Plan or any Plan.

55 minutes ago, T2Eagle said:

But aren't all LCs, and a certain number of COs, in the class of "Indirect Abuse Claimants"? So shouldn't they get to vote on any Plan?

(And that's one of the complaints against the current Plan... it doesn't explain a legal basis for giving LCs and COs a lower priority than Direct Abuse Claimants.)

[ParkMan]

13 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

 

Maybe? The point is that BSA is asking you to give up any claim you have today OR MAY HAVE IN THE FUTURE regarding your sexual abuse. So, even if NOW, TODAY you have no actionable claim (no SoL lookback) someday, you may. If this plan closes the door on ANY claim against BSA, now (Sol lookback states) or in the future (state legislature approves a SoL lookback), you get a vote.

At least, that is how I read it.

But does a potentially future actionable claim matter if the BSA is the sole organization involved after the US Trustee's objection?  Doesn't chapter 11 or chapter 7 really push for a determination of who has claims, what assets are available to settle those claims, and if the organization is financially viable afterwards?   Does a "we might have a claim someday" go pretty low on the list?  If at all?

Isn't the settlement more applicable only if the LCs are joining so that their future liability goes away?

[CynicalScouter]

9 minutes ago, ParkMan said:

Doesn't chapter 11 or chapter 7 really push for a determination of who has claims, what assets are available to settle those claims, and if the organization is financially viable afterwards?   

Yep. Which is what BSA should have done from the start (20/20 hindsight). Instead, they tried to cut a cloth that would cover EVERYONE for EVERYTHING and spent 1+ years and 100 million on: nothing.

Now, we'll get to where we should have been in fall 2020:

1) How much of the $1.4 billion in BSA assets are subject to be sold/transferred to a victims fund.

2) How many victims? And how much? And how severe?

3) Take the amount of money from 1), divided by the information from 2), and start sending out checks.

[mrjohns2]

35 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

One thing that does bother me (and I don't know whether you've seen it in the IVFs from your own council, contemporaneous with your abuse) is that sometimes the council refunded an IV's current-year registration fee, $.50, or $1.00, or whatever. I would have thought conduct sufficient to deny registration would have been just cause to forfeit the fee!

I read a number of the "you are no longer a volunteer" letters. Granted it was me reading between the lines, but I saw it as "You are no longer a volunteer. Here is your money back; you have no claim to sill be a volunteer since your registration has been canceled and refunded. Case closed."

[ThenNow]

1 hour ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

But aren't all LCs, and a certain number of COs, in the class of "Indirect Abuse Claimants"? So shouldn't they get to vote on any Plan?

If I misspoke, apologies. Again, not my bailiwick. I should qualify things with a near ignorance footnote or refer people to CS or MyMVA. Regardless, how many LC's? Rounded to 260? CO's that filed? Anywhere near 55,000 or 84,000 total claimants? What percentage...? If they vote, is the number anywhere near relevant?

[ThenNow]

2 hours ago, Eagle1993 said:

So 100% of claims from 1979 and prior are within state laws of New York/New Jersey.

Is this so? If so, what exactly is the application to pre-1979 cases outside of NY/NJ? I've not heard this before.

[fred8033]

2 hours ago, ThenNow said:

Yes. Yes. No. Can't answer etceteras. 

 

Yes, but "Scouting" was still in contact with the parents. Feel free to wager. You don't think there's a very real possibility they were asked to stand down and let the BSA deal with it? Really? It was taken seriously if there was an incident report and a jacket created. I can check the law at the time, but I have no idea why you would assume the "right laws" were not in place. Yes, as I said, I'm sure the family didn't want ABMSL ("ABUSED BY MY SCOUT LEADER") tattooed on their 11 year old's forehead. I get it 100% and said so. My dad would've killed him and ended it...and gone to prison destroying our family. I feel you keep dumping off the BSA liability and that's fine. Have at in a buy a donut, coffee and hold a klatch to chew on it. Back to the sociological, cultural and philosophical discussion, which I'm happy to have. 

If the right laws were in place ... if the right education and training was in place ... there was no way this should have been dropped once the police report happened.  

You say I'm dumping BSA liability.  I'd say you are misbranding BSA as a self-interested evil doer.  BSA was filled with millions and millions of volunteer and paid professions who were 100% focused on doing right by the youth.  When things fell below the line, it was the aberration and not the norm. 

The situation sounds exactly like a product of the times.  But you are right in one way.  I do view the IVF as an effort to prevent abuse and was better than many organizations at the time.  

[CynicalScouter]

3 minutes ago, ThenNow said:

Is this so? If so, what exactly is the application to pre-1979 cases outside of NY/NJ? I've not heard this before.

I think the argument boils down to this:

The abuse may have happened in Montana, and the negligence on the part of the (Montana based) CO and the negligence of the (Montana base) Local Council occurred in Montana, however claims against BSA's negligence (alleging officials there were in charge/negligence in how they handled claims of abuse such as through the IV files) lie in New Jersey or New York.

It's...an argument. But having personally read through several of the NY/NJ complaints, I just cannot see that this is actually happening. In other words, I do NOT see out of the 900+ lawsuits already filed many (or any) filed in NY or NJ that are claiming BSA liable for conduct that occurred in another state, in particular one without a SoL lookback, by asserting a right under the NY or NJ statute based on BSA's status as headquartered there.

If @Eagle1993knows of such a case, I'm all ears.