Chapter 11 Announced - Part 4 Revised Plan

[ThenNow]

42 minutes ago, David CO said:

Some people are talking about the IV files as if everyone who was banned from scouting was a pedophile.  This is wrong.  

I am grateful for this clarification, which was also found in the Ernst memo.

Edited August 5, 2021 by ThenNow

[CynicalScouter]

Just a heads up for the week:

1) Century filed a motion to have a hearing as earlier as tomorrow (August 6) regarding discovery and document production from BSA. That will likely popup as a hearing at some point.

2) It looks like next week's hearing on August 12 has a built-in time limit: the judge has scheduled the BSA hearing for 10am but has also scheduled another hearing for 2:30pm.

https://www.deb.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/moveit/LSS.html

[vol_scouter]

@CynicalScouter

Might the scheduling indicate that the expectation is that RSA will be acceptable to everyone but perhaps the insurance companies and maybe the CO's?  Or do you think that it is just providing the only available time?  Obviously, I am hopeful that this will soon move to voting and that it will be over this year.

[CynicalScouter]

26 minutes ago, vol_scouter said:

@CynicalScouter

Might the scheduling indicate that the expectation is that RSA will be acceptable to everyone but perhaps the insurance companies and maybe the CO's?  Or do you think that it is just providing the only available time?  Obviously, I am hopeful that this will soon move to voting and that it will be over this year.

Hard to say. One possibility is that the oral argument is expected to be anti-climatic. She may be the type of judge for which a hearing is just a necessity and she makes up het mind on the briefs. I’ve know judge who pre-write their opinion and the hearing is used to fill in some gaps.

Or it may be that while the RSA is important, it is only the foreshadowing for the main event; the disclosure statement hearing.

There are three ways this plays out:

1) The judge approves the RSA, the Hartford deal is out, and we head into the disclosure hearing with the TCC, FCR, and a Coalition in full support. That is where the real fight is.

2) Approval with minor modifications that don’t cause the whole RSA to collapse 

3) Rejection. The question then becomes why did the judge reject it and it is something that can be solved/fixed. If, for example, it is rejected because it sticks it to the COs maybe that gets worked out in mediation. If however it is because the Hartford deal is deemed binding on BSA, that is probably unfixable and the TCC FCR and Coalition go into full opposition mode.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 6, 2021 by CynicalScouter

[vol_scouter]

@CynicalScouter Thank You!!!

[SiouxRanger]

4 hours ago, David CO said:

Many of those people were banned from scouting for non-sexual reasons. 

For political reasons largely dealing with questioning council finances or council procedures, troublesome volunteers were removed. The BSA process is more akin to Franz Kafka's The Trial, than the protections embodied in the Bill of Rights. Litigation contesting the BSA process seems to favor the BSA. I haven't come across any case where the volunteer managed to obtain a judicial reversal of  BSA's revocation of membership If anyone has a citation, please post it..

[Eagle94-A1]

From the one case I am familiar with, the individual was temporarily reinstated while the trial was going on. When he lost his case, membership was revoked. Individual had an appeal filed, but when SCOTUS ruled on the Dale case, saying BSA had a right to approve and reject members, he ended his appeal.

[InquisitiveScouter]

@SiouxRanger, concur.

For all...whenever they ask for your opinion on surveys, they don't really mean it...and never put your name in the "yes, you can contact me" portions if you have given input on anything that could be interpreted as criticizing the organization.  For the professionals, "feedback is not a gift".  And I have several personal experiences (scar tissue) in this, having questioned finances, program, YPT, condition of properties, etc. And your decades of volunteer service don't give your opinions (or facts) any weight 😵

 

[DavidLeeLambert]

On 8/4/2021 at 12:32 PM, Eagle94-A1 said:

Not everyone in the files  were arrested and convicted. OldScout448 mentions how one abuser did not have charges pressed by the parents, but was placed in those files. One person I know who was placed in the IVF did have a criminal investigation done, and was essentially exonerated by the investigators.

 

On 8/4/2021 at 12:54 PM, ThenNow said:

I think we need to keep in mind that fabricating abuse is rare, though I’m happy to exclude political and financial motives in the recent climate. As a victim, I hate it. “Entirely sure” is a very high bar that would likely negate a tremendous number of viable cases, at least before significant investigation. Young boys are quiet  about these things and getting them talking details can be difficult. 

Hence the requirements in YPT (and similar training I had to go through for my church) that adults take an initial youth report of anything that sounds like abuse at face value, and personally report it to the authorities; and report anything that looks like deliberate or careless noncompliance with the rules internally within the organization.

But there's a difference between taking a child's report at face value for the purposes of starting an investigation and taking immediate steps to make sure the child is safe on the one hand, and being completely credulous about a story that has lain dormant for more than half the lifetime of an aged adult on the other.

I wonder about some of claimants in this case, not just the thousands who submitted claim-forms with basic details missing (or on whose behalf certain attorneys submitted such forms), but even some of the parties who have written letters to the Judge.

Here's how one recent letter, from "T.K.", [D.I.5749], begins...

https://casedocs.omniagentsolutions.com/cmsvol2/pub_47373/b96e52f4-034b-4b34-9423-62ff75855b3c_5749.pdf

"Your honor,

"This, my second letter to you is to clarify any misunderstandings as per my first letter to you."

(There are other letters from "T.K." on the docket, but they don't match this writer's handwriting or the details in this letter, so perhaps his other letter was lost in the mail, or misaddressed, or perhaps it was filed as his claim.)

"I've written other similar letters before, except for the 'scouts' part. When events and circumstances repeat themselves enough times, that I'm essentially 'tipped-off' that my current letter for help was not successful, by also the behavior of enemies. [...]"

"I thought it a necessary gesture to tell my sister about the BSA litigation and my attorney [redacted], so I am confident about my assumption of my sister contacting you, the BSA, my attorney, etc. to cause harm. | So if they did communicate with you, they lied."

The writer goes on to say, as far as I can tell, that he worked/volunteered as an undercover drug informant while still in High School, in the mid-70's. The sister of one dealer was killed as retribution for various dealers being caught in a sting. The writer then says "... her brother threatened me with a gun, threatening to rape my little sister." He told his Scoutmaster and his sister (assuming he only has one sister, that would be the same sister who was threatened, and who now might be contacting the BSA to contradict his story) about the threat, and "one or both put the badmouth on me right away." That's the only mention of his Scoutmaster in the entire 15-page letter.

He does claim that reports that he is a registered sex offender, performed a drive-by shooting, pushed dope while in the Army, committed burglaries, and took "psycho-meds" are all untrue, and that the NCIC record is for "someone with my same name".

I've seen other letters that have more details about the actual abuse (or appear to have them, hidden by redactions), followed by allegations that the writer took drugs, got drunk, was abusive to spouse and children, committed other crimes, etc., all in reaction to the abuse.  That all makes sense as plausible consequences, but the older the claimant is, the more time has elapsed during which he didn't tell anyone, the less external evidence he has that he even was in Scouts at all, and the more serious his intermediate drug-use, commitment or incarceration has been, the harder it will probably be to convince a jury that any particular person or organization is responsible for his current challenges.

In other words, someone who submitted a claim-form or wrote a letter may sincerely believe that certain people did certain things to him in 1965 or 1975, but if he later took LSD or some other drug, did the "bad trip" alter his memory? Perhaps he really was abused, but by a different person, and the drugs altered his memory of who abused him or where it happened? Perhaps he had a consensual sexual experience as a young adult (or while above the age of consent under state law or actual community custom at the time), and the drugs caused him to misremember his age and the fact of the consent? Or perhaps the drugs caused him to remember a report he saw on TV once as something that happened to him? Or if he was in solitary confinement in prison, could that have had a similar mind-altering effect?

At the hearing where she said she would go forward with the Rule 2009 motion, the Judge asked the attorneys to also brief her about the "thousands" of letters she had received. Actually, it's not quite that many. Each letter received goes on the docket twice, once as "SEALED", not viewable by the public, and once as "REDACTED". As of August 4th, there were only 1,150 such "REDACTED" letters on the docket.

And one of the attorneys who spoke at the most-recent hearing said that only about half of the letters appear to be from claimants connected with AIS.

[ThenNow]

1 hour ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

In other words, someone who submitted a claim-form or wrote a letter may sincerely believe that certain people did certain things to him in 1965 or 1975, but if he later took LSD or some other drug, did the "bad trip" alter his memory? Perhaps he really was abused, but by a different person, and the drugs altered his memory of who abused him or where it happened? Perhaps he had a consensual sexual experience as a young adult (or while above the age of consent under state law or actual community custom at the time), and the drugs caused him to misremember his age and the fact of the consent? Or perhaps the drugs caused him to remember a report he saw on TV once as something that happened to him? Or if he was in solitary confinement in prison, could that have had a similar mind-altering effect?

Yes, and, perhaps, he was abducted by Galactic BSA aliens at the precise moment he was about to become of age and they took him either forward or backward in time (we really don’t know) and did sexual and unspeakable things to him, but the question persists as to whether he was of age in the time/space continuum of galactic travel such that he may or may not have been a minor and we’re unable to locate the Captain’s Log from the craft that took him, though he did manage to snap a selfie with the fairly clear image of the tail numbers...? What is the precise point to all of these posited what if’s? 

PS - The BSA Galactic Aliens were sponsored by a local NM peyote devotee club and met weekly at their smoke lodge. 

Edited August 6, 2021 by ThenNow

[johnsch322]

55 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

 

Hence the requirements in YPT (and similar training I had to go through for my church) that adults take an initial youth report of anything that sounds like abuse at face value, and personally report it to the authorities; and report anything that looks like deliberate or careless noncompliance with the rules internally within the organization.

But there's a difference between taking a child's report at face value for the purposes of starting an investigation and taking immediate steps to make sure the child is safe on the one hand, and being completely credulous about a story that has lain dormant for more than half the lifetime of an aged adult on the other.

I wonder about some of claimants in this case, not just the thousands who submitted claim-forms with basic details missing (or on whose behalf certain attorneys submitted such forms), but even some of the parties who have written letters to the Judge.

Here's how one recent letter, from "T.K.", [D.I.5749], begins...

https://casedocs.omniagentsolutions.com/cmsvol2/pub_47373/b96e52f4-034b-4b34-9423-62ff75855b3c_5749.pdf

"Your honor,

"This, my second letter to you is to clarify any misunderstandings as per my first letter to you."

(There are other letters from "T.K." on the docket, but they don't match this writer's handwriting or the details in this letter, so perhaps his other letter was lost in the mail, or misaddressed, or perhaps it was filed as his claim.)

"I've written other similar letters before, except for the 'scouts' part. When events and circumstances repeat themselves enough times, that I'm essentially 'tipped-off' that my current letter for help was not successful, by also the behavior of enemies. [...]"

"I thought it a necessary gesture to tell my sister about the BSA litigation and my attorney [redacted], so I am confident about my assumption of my sister contacting you, the BSA, my attorney, etc. to cause harm. | So if they did communicate with you, they lied."

The writer goes on to say, as far as I can tell, that he worked/volunteered as an undercover drug informant while still in High School, in the mid-70's. The sister of one dealer was killed as retribution for various dealers being caught in a sting. The writer then says "... her brother threatened me with a gun, threatening to rape my little sister." He told his Scoutmaster and his sister (assuming he only has one sister, that would be the same sister who was threatened, and who now might be contacting the BSA to contradict his story) about the threat, and "one or both put the badmouth on me right away." That's the only mention of his Scoutmaster in the entire 15-page letter.

He does claim that reports that he is a registered sex offender, performed a drive-by shooting, pushed dope while in the Army, committed burglaries, and took "psycho-meds" are all untrue, and that the NCIC record is for "someone with my same name".

I've seen other letters that have more details about the actual abuse (or appear to have them, hidden by redactions), followed by allegations that the writer took drugs, got drunk, was abusive to spouse and children, committed other crimes, etc., all in reaction to the abuse.  That all makes sense as plausible consequences, but the older the claimant is, the more time has elapsed during which he didn't tell anyone, the less external evidence he has that he even was in Scouts at all, and the more serious his intermediate drug-use, commitment or incarceration has been, the harder it will probably be to convince a jury that any particular person or organization is responsible for his current challenges.

In other words, someone who submitted a claim-form or wrote a letter may sincerely believe that certain people did certain things to him in 1965 or 1975, but if he later took LSD or some other drug, did the "bad trip" alter his memory? Perhaps he really was abused, but by a different person, and the drugs altered his memory of who abused him or where it happened? Perhaps he had a consensual sexual experience as a young adult (or while above the age of consent under state law or actual community custom at the time), and the drugs caused him to misremember his age and the fact of the consent? Or perhaps the drugs caused him to remember a report he saw on TV once as something that happened to him? Or if he was in solitary confinement in prison, could that have had a similar mind-altering effect?

At the hearing where she said she would go forward with the Rule 2009 motion, the Judge asked the attorneys to also brief her about the "thousands" of letters she had received. Actually, it's not quite that many. Each letter received goes on the docket twice, once as "SEALED", not viewable by the public, and once as "REDACTED". As of August 4th, there were only 1,150 such "REDACTED" letters on the docket.

And one of the attorneys who spoke at the most-recent hearing said that only about half of the letters appear to be from claimants connected with AIS.

In California before a claim can be filed in court for sexual abuse claimants above a certain age must have a psychiatrist interview and certify that in their opinion that there was sexual abuse. I forget what age that is but I did have to go thru that procedure.  I believe once the psychiatrists report is written that by itself is taken to a judge.  I can tell you for a fact that in my case the interview lasted for about an hour and was not just for rubber stamping purposes.  I am sure that something similar would weed out many claimants in the bankruptcy.  

[MYCVAStory]

42 minutes ago, DavidLeeLambert said:

I wonder about some of claimants in this case, not just the thousands who submitted claim-forms with basic details missing (or on whose behalf certain attorneys submitted such forms), but even some of the parties who have written letters to the Judge.

Yes.  This reminds me of two items.  One, the TCC has said that it is an advocate of a robust system of claim validation and that one dollar going to an invalid claim is one dollar denied to a valid one.  As the saying goes, to those who are given much, much is expected.  We can all argue what a "robust" validation process will look like but that's where a Trust and validation professionals they hire (yes, there are firms that specialize in this as it relates to abuse) come in.  If you expect the maximum payment though it really is reasonable to expect that claimants will do more than take a little time to fill out a single form.  Will this require interviews and take time?  Probably, but given the number of claims that die was cast.  I'm sure this forum and others will do a great service to share experiences as a process is known.  Second, this comment also gets at the protests of the insurers; that there are scores of bogus claims.  To that I say a resounding "SO WHAT?"   If there are bogus claims, they are discovered, or those committing fraud take an early low payout it does one thing, leaves more money for deserving victims.   It's exactly why the TCC and Coalition are fighting for the maximum amount from the insurers.  Only by doing so, and having a robust validation system, will funds remain that aren't more insulting to victims than would be otherwise.  Did people see some late-night infomercial, say "I was in the scouts.  I could use some money" and call an 800 number?  Beats me.  What I do know is that I was abused and beyond proof of that impact and reports from my counselors I'm happy to sit down and tell my story.  I've spoken to other victims and I've spoken to someone who has had to interview them.  His opinion was the same as mine.  When it comes to child sexual abuse it doesn't take long to know when someone is telling the truth.  I really do hope that most victims will embrace and encourage a robust validation process instead of being scared by it.  If you were a victim it will help you and all true victims.  Oh, and occupy a few months of our time on this forum too! 🙂 

[CynicalScouter]

1 hour ago, MYCVAStory said:

Second, this comment also gets at the protests of the insurers; that there are scores of bogus claims.  To that I say a resounding "SO WHAT?"   If there are bogus claims, they are discovered, or those committing fraud take an early low payout it does one thing, leaves more money for deserving victims.

Yes but I believe the idea, one pushed by both the insurance companies and at least some of the attorneys for the abuse victims, was and is that those with "bogus" claims shouldn't be allowed to vote on the plan at all.

It's one thing AFTER the plan to simply vet these out and/or payout $3500. It is another to say they should get a vote at all.

[Sentinel947]

17 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

Yes but I believe the idea, one pushed by both the insurance companies and at least some of the attorneys for the abuse victims, was and is that those with "bogus" claims shouldn't be allowed to vote on the plan at all.

It's one thing AFTER the plan to simply vet these out and/or payout $3500. It is another to say they should get a vote at all.

And the insurance companies are probably concerned they are contributing money to the pot for "bogus" claims. Yea, those claims might get vetted out, but the insurance companies want to pay as little as possible. 

[yknot]

3 hours ago, InquisitiveScouter said:

@SiouxRanger, concur.

For all...whenever they ask for your opinion on surveys, they don't really mean it...and never put your name in the "yes, you can contact me" portions if you have given input on anything that could be interpreted as criticizing the organization.  For the professionals, "feedback is not a gift".  And I have several personal experiences (scar tissue) in this, having questioned finances, program, YPT, condition of properties, etc. And your decades of volunteer service don't give your opinions (or facts) any weight 😵

 

We've discussed this in other threads but almost all of the BSA surveys I've taken are guided -- meaning the survey is constructed in such a way as to give support to an already desired conclusion. Gatekeeper questions keep leading responses that move towards the hoped for answers. This is a very common technique and is used by almost every entity with an agenda.