Chapter 11 announced - Part 14 - Plan Effective

[Eagle1970]

I listened to the town hall, last night.  Or at least the first half.  That was about all I could take.  There is no money for release to victims beyond the 1.5% of the allowed amount, which is already paid.  The Purdue case has thrown a wrench into the Appeal to the 3rd Circuit of the Bankruptcy Plan.  The next step is briefs from both sides of the impact of the Supreme Court ruling on Purdue to the BSA plan.  That has clearly slowed down the 3rd circuit.  No estimate of when the 3rd circuit will decide on the SC ruling applicability and further no indication on when the 3rd circuit will resolve the BSA case.  Then there is no indication on whether THAT will be appealed to the SC.  The trustee congratulated the trust on getting so much done in under 1.5 years.  However, WE have been waiting nearly 5 years.  Just wondering how many will not outlive distribution or if the plan will even be permitted a path forward.

[ThenNow]

On 7/24/2024 at 8:44 PM, MYCVAStory said:

I was asked to pass the message below on to Survivors.  It doesn't constitute an endorsement on my part.  It's for information.  That said, I do find it intriguing that an attorney, with no shortage of experience in the US Bankruptcy system, is calling BS on the way attorneys take 40% for essentially filling out a form.  I Know, in a lot of cases they do more than that but how great would it be to see a change where those who need more pay more and those who need less pay less.  You know....like any other service we purchase!  It doesn't apply to my personal situation but given that a number of Survivors on this forum have expressed concerns about "the system" I'm passing it on.  I hope anyone reaching out to this attorney will share their opinion of the discussion.  Again, I'm not an attorney, I have no financial interest in this, and I didn't sleep at a Holiday Inn last night.  I'm just passing it on.

July 22, 2024

 

To Survivors who have filed claims in the Boy Scouts bankruptcy case:

 

My name is Lawrence Friedman.  I am a former Director of the US Trustee Program.  Prior to my appointment to that position, I was a bankruptcy trustee in Detroit where I administered more than 10,000 bankruptcy cases under both Chapter 7 and Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy code.  I discovered considerable fraud and abuse in the bankruptcy system, and I began writing and speaking about my findings, ultimately testifying multiple times before the US Senate Subcommittee on proposed reforms to the bankruptcy system.  My inside view led to my appointment as the Director of the Program responsible for the oversight of the bankruptcy system.  Within 90 days of my appointment, I was faced with the mega bankruptcies of Enron, WorldCom and Adelphia.  I immediately championed a change in policy which mandated the appointment of examiners in each of these cases.  Examiners bring transparency to the process, and examiners also act as a clearing house for information thus adding efficiencies to the administration of these cases. 

 

Since leaving the Department of Justice, I have been increasingly troubled by the use of the bankruptcy system to solve societal problems.  My focus is on these mass tort cases where victim Survivors are being victimized again by bad actor tort lawyers.  I believe that my team can bring these matters to the attention of the Court and effectively free up more than $70,000,000.00 in funds which these lawyers are claiming in fees and which rightfully should go to Survivors.  The explosion of claims within these cases is particularly troubling.  I have authored several editorials and white papers on this topic.  That said, real change comes from action.

 

I have been reviewing claims filed in the BSA case and I am appalled by the practices of some of the attorneys.  Many used claim aggregators to solicit clients and filed claims in these cases using the standard bankruptcy proof of claim form.  The claim form is available online and was designed to allow non-lawyers to fill it out.  The form doesn’t even have to be correct because if it’s not the debtor will object to the claim, and you get an opportunity to fix it.  Yet every law firm that solicited large numbers of claimants had the client sign a one-page retainer agreement that gives the lawyers a 40% contingency fee for doing nothing more than filing out this form.  The lawyers want to pretend this is a typical contingency fee case when in fact all they did was simply fill out a form.  Rather than collecting 40% of the money paid to victims, these lawyers should get a fee similar to petition preparers – non- lawyers who help people fill out forms to be filed in court – which would be more like $150.00.  There are other serious problems with these retainer agreements such as whether they comply with state laws and state bar ethics rules. 

 

Just as in the mega corporate cases, transparency in these mass tort cases is critical to fairness.  My firm wants to help Survivors get the attention and assistance they deserve.  Any compensation we receive would be a small fraction of the 40% they are being overcharged now!"

 

I am interested in chatting with any victim Survivors who have expressed dissatisfaction with the manner in which their claim has been handled by their current counsel.  They can contact me with no obligation at:mailto:lfriedman@friedmanpartners.net

 

 

 

Hm. I am grateful to hear this, given what I've learned from friends who are represented by some of the callcenter "aggregating" firms. And, as another pro se claimant, I am sympathetic and agree with Eagle70. I have third perspective on top of those two.

Ghosts. First, the Century insurance attorneys did a great job briefing how the callcenters solicited and collected claims, including: 1) awarding individual and team bonuses for claims "signed up" daily and weekly; 2) falsely validating claims even when a caller decided not to go forward based on the questions asked, and 3) a fair number of such claims were found to facially deficient but the agent decided they could "fill in the blanks" later. Critically, some of the pay for play attorneys who were not even tort litigators simply signed the POC and submitted them, then ghosted clients while waiting for their 40%. As an attorney, claimant, former lead plaintiff in a (successful) class action suit, their behavior was moral malpractice IMNSHO. Legal malpractice? Probably not. Unconscionable in either case. 

However, some of the firms that paid for assistance to identify potential claimants in this case, spent 100 hours interviewing and vetting their clients before completing and having their clients sign the POF. One of my friends is with such a firm and I asked him how it was going during that phase of the case. "It's brutal," he said, "Interviewing and learning the experience of these men is the worst thing I've ever had to do..."

Do It Yourself. Second, as a pro se claimant in a not altogether closed state under the Shades of Gray chart, thinking of giving someone 40% was unbearable. If my award turned out to be significant and I served up to them my collected records of impacts and the narrative I prepared was not something I was willing to do. My POC was 130 ish pages long and the Trust Claim added a huge pile because I included research and a brief on fraudulent concealment. That defense was based on the fact my LC Executive was at least complicit in the abuse of many boys by my SM while managing another IVF process for CSA 2 miles from the location of my Troop. I knew the ASM who was booted for abuse at our sister Troop. One of my best friends and his brothers, as well as their dad, were in that Troop. That SE was also aware of 13 other BSA abuse cases in my area of the state over the time  period I was in Scouting. I attached all of the IVF and newspaper reports where there were criminal prosecutions and civil awards. Anywho, my documentation was significant. I am due whatever comes of this. I recognize I am not the typical pro se claimant. 

Class Action. Third and finally, I was lead plaintiff in a class action case where the attorneys received a large percentage of a multi-million dollar claim, spread across 1200 plaintiffs in the certified class. The case was for wrongful denial of a valid depression treatment Aetna claimed was "investigative and experiment," even though every major hospital in the US offered it. Almost all of the other plaintiffs were contacted by the firm based on the records of the insurance company and there was simple validation of their attempt to get treatment. It wasn't needed. Did my attorneys deserve a percentage of their award even though they did very, very little for 1199 plaintiffs in the class? I believe they did and earned it. The case we prepared to prove my claim and to certify the class was a massive amount of work, expensive and Aetna had an army of attorneys fighting us. 

Conclusion. This is complicated overall, much less so here. As I've said in this and other threads on the forum, the do-nothing, ghosting attorneys and firms do not deserve 40%. I have several friends that came through their 1-800 lines who have gotten horrible representation. My view is the scenario is exacerbated when firms have 100's of sparsely vetted clients and then signed the POC against the admonition of Judge. I say, go after them and ferret out the unethical lot. 

-The End

PS - Forgive speed typos. I'm supposed to be on vacation...

[ThenNow]

On 8/15/2024 at 10:39 AM, Eagle1970 said:

I listened to the town hall, last night.  Or at least the first half.  That was about all I could take.  There is no money for release to victims beyond the 1.5% of the allowed amount, which is already paid.  The Purdue case has thrown a wrench into the Appeal to the 3rd Circuit of the Bankruptcy Plan.  The next step is briefs from both sides of the impact of the Supreme Court ruling on Purdue to the BSA plan.  That has clearly slowed down the 3rd circuit.  No estimate of when the 3rd circuit will decide on the SC ruling applicability and further no indication on when the 3rd circuit will resolve the BSA case.  Then there is no indication on whether THAT will be appealed to the SC.  The trustee congratulated the trust on getting so much done in under 1.5 years.  However, WE have been waiting nearly 5 years.  Just wondering how many will not outlive distribution or if the plan will even be permitted a path forward.

I wish she was trauma-informed enough to realize how offensive her repeated self-aggrandizement is to us. How much is she (not) earning per month, again?

[johnsch322]

6 hours ago, ThenNow said:

I'm supposed to be on vacation...

Enjoy your vacation. I welcome your viewpoint.

[Eagle1970]

9 hours ago, ThenNow said:

I wish she was trauma-informed enough to realize how offensive her repeated self-aggrandizement is to us. How much is she (not) earning per month, again?

Tried to PM you with relevant info that may be of help, but you are set to not receive messages.

[Muttsy]

Judge Krauss is the presiding judge on the panel!!

We who are rooting that the court reverses this horribly rotten Plan could not have drawn a better judge in the whole country! She’s the biggest opponent of equitable mootness there is. She wants to abolish the doctrine. 
 

Oral arguments Nov 6. 3rd Circuit US Court of Appeals. Philadelphia 10:00 am. 

[Muttsy]

17 hours ago, Muttsy said:

Judge Krauss is the presiding judge on the panel!!

We who are rooting that the court reverses this horribly rotten Plan could not have drawn a better judge in the whole country! She’s the biggest opponent of equitable mootness there is. She wants to abolish the doctrine. 
 

Oral arguments Nov 6. 3rd Circuit US Court of Appeals. Philadelphia 10:00 am. 

Read this Krause opinion and tell me you can’t see where this is headed. Plan is likely going south. 
 

https://casetext.com/case/in-re-one2one-commcns-llc

[Eagle1970]

After having my award reduced by 90% I don't have much to lose if it does fail.  The administrator could have used a 75% reduction, as the state of my abuse is in the 10-25% SOL factor.  But she chose 10% (90% reduction) and was inflexible upon reconsideration.  But I am curious.  What occurs with survivors if the plan is killed?  Liquidation?  

[Muttsy]

 

1. BSA NATIONAL LIQUIDATES and/ or

2. Insurance companies pony up a LOT more $$$ to liquidation trustee  

3 LC’s Liquidate and/or see 2 above

. 
4. Charter orgs voluntarily liquidate or file Ch 11. also See 2 above. 
 

4. Some survivors carry on with litigation including bad faith claims against insurance companies. 
 

5. More states open or reopen windows to allow more survivors a path to just compensation. See 2 above. 
 

6. Scouting becomes a verb again, not a brand name  Many regional and local scouting organizations form and compete with each other to develop the safest system, best and lower cost scouting experience not having to carry the corrupt dead weight of the bureaucracy. Scouting discovers its roots again.  

 

[Ojoman]

13 hours ago, Eagle1970 said:

After having my award reduced by 90% I don't have much to lose if it does fail.  The administrator could have used a 75% reduction, as the state of my abuse is in the 10-25% SOL factor.  But she chose 10% (90% reduction) and was inflexible upon reconsideration.  But I am curious.  What occurs with survivors if the plan is killed?  Liquidation?  

Be nice if they reduced the lawyers comp. I saw where of the 2.4 billion that 1 billion went to the lawyers. Should have gone to the survivors. 

[skeptic]

Just posted on Aaron on Scouting.  It appears that finally the issue is recognized on broader screen world wide.  

 

https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2024/10/21/five-things-i-learned-from-scouting-americas-safeguarding-youth-symposium/

[fred8033]

On 10/21/2024 at 10:07 AM, Ojoman said:

Be nice if they reduced the lawyers comp. I saw where of the 2.4 billion that 1 billion went to the lawyers. Should have gone to the survivors. 

Should not be a surprise.

[SiouxRanger]

On 10/21/2024 at 10:07 AM, Ojoman said:

Be nice if they reduced the lawyers comp. I saw where of the 2.4 billion that 1 billion went to the lawyers. Should have gone to the survivors. 

As the many months of this whole process have laid bare, there are many counter-intuitive results.  National and insurance companies escaping largely unscathed, while the "totally independent" local councils, say what, "volunteer" to a council, to pay the bulk of National's debt.

With respect to attorney's fees, another contra-intuitive result obtains:  attorney's fees are the result of a private agreement between client and attorney and not part of the bankruptcy proceeding, per se.

I am not a bankruptcy practitioner, much less an expert, but I recall a local bankruptcy judge mandating maximum fees for individual bankruptcies. But that was many years ago.

If bankruptcy judges have the authority to limit attorney's fees, either the judges are not inclined to do so on their own initiative, or no one has filed a Petition/Motion and asked the judge to consider the issue.

Being an attorney (I am hoping for a better outcome in the next life) under the circumstances, 40% is obscene.

Just my $250,000,000.00 worth.

[Ojoman]

On 10/23/2024 at 9:39 PM, SiouxRanger said:

Being an attorney (I am hoping for a better outcome in the next life) under the circumstances, 40% is obscene.

A little humility and a little humor should always be appreciated. I've known many really good, even great attorneys and a couple that I'm pretty certain will find a particularly uncomfortably warm spot waiting for them in the next life. Thanks for your thoughts. 

[Eagle94-A1]

So if the settlement is declared null and void, what happens to the money that councils gave National for the settlement? Will camps on the selling block be put on hold? What about COs that put money towards to settlement? Will post 1970s COs have insurance coverage from National cover any lawsuits against them per the charter agreements?