When a scout is slandered in writing by a Scouter do the parents have a right to know?

[EagleParent]

Does a scout's parents have the right to know when their son has been slandered in writing by an adult in the troop? Can the leadership of the troop keep the slander quiet and just talk to the offending adult and ask them not to do it again?

 

In this case the scout was accused in writing of 'gross moral misconduct'. The letter was sent outside of the troop and asked for the scout to be removed. Eventually the SM was informed of this letter. There followed a meeting between selected leaders and the letter writer. The letter writer was 'chastised', as the other leaders felt the complaints weren't valid or the scout had not done them. No action was ever taken against the scout.

 

Do the parents have a legitimate reason to up upset that they weren't informed. A lawyer did look at the letter and deemed it "slanderous" and "dispicable".

[Gold Winger]

I would have thought that a lawyer would have called it "libelous" and

"despicable." I guess I was mistaken.

[scoutldr]

GW's point is that slander is verbal...libel is written. If you've already consulted an attorney, there's nothing we can say that would add to that. If you have proof, your beef is with the writer, not with the troop.

[CalicoPenn]

I'm confused - the letter was sent outside the Troop? Does that mean it was sent to Council? What is the relationship of the letter writer to the Scout? Committee Member? Assistant Scoutmaster? Scoutmaster?

 

Who investigated the complaint? Who was the "select group of Scouters"? Who did they call as character witnesses? How could they possibly investigate this complaint without informing the parents of the Scout?

 

There is only one honorable way to handle this. Remove the letter writer from the Troop, and petition to the Scout Executive to remove him/her from Scouting completely. Sit down and talk with the parents, inform them of the charges, inform them that no one felt it had any validity, and inform them that the letter writer is gone from the Troop - premanently (and if this means losing the letter writers sons, so be it), and hope against hope that the parents are reasonable, will ignore the fact that they weren't informed of this right away, and will accept that the letter writer is out of the picture.

 

Alternatively, do nothing and hope against the very slim hope that the parents never find out about this in some other way (rumor mill, slip up, etc.) and find themselves a lawyer that agrees that it was libelous (slanderous) and despicable who goes after not just the letter writer but every one involved in trying to cover this up. Don't, for a second, think that the parents won't someday learn about this.

 

Or have they already learned about this. You also ask if they have a legitimate reason to be upset that they weren't informed. That implies that they weren't informed but learned about it anyway, and are now angry that they weren't told.

 

The parents have an absolute right to know that their son has been falsely accused by someone of "gross moral misconduct". The libel is secondary. They have that right so they can protect their son against such false charges in the future. You have no guarantees that the letter writer won't try this same tactic outside the BSA wall, so to speak. There may be issues between this family and the letter writers family that you aren't aware of. There may be issues between this Scout and the letter writer's family that the parents aren't aware of. There may be a need for this family to take legal precautions to protect themselves and their son. You may have, depending on your state, a legal duty to inform. Regardless, you have a moral and ethical duty to inform (in my opinion).

 

Put another way, wouldn't you, as a parent, want to know if false accusations were made against your son, and wouldn't you want to learn of it upfront and not through the rumor mill?

 

Do what's right - tell the parents - and if they already learned from unoffical sources and are steamed, then apologize, profusely, for not informing them earlier.

 

Calico

[Beavah]

Yah, EagleParent, welcome to da forums, eh?

 

There's really not enough information in your post for any of us to give yeh very good advice. I'm always a bit leery of throwin' around technical legal terms like libel without havin' a good understandin' of the nature of the letter and who the parties were, eh?

 

The simple answer to your question of whether "parents have the right to know" is "no." This isn't a question of "rights." Similarly, da answer to "can the leadership of the troop just talk to the offending adult?" is "yes." Whether or not it's da right course depends a lot on what the circumstances are, and yeh don't really give us enough to go on. Might be OK, might be a very poor choice.

 

Do parents have a legitimate reason to be upset? Dependin' on the nature of the letter, and whether the leader had communicated first with the parents or not, maybe? They might have reason to be livid. But it's not clear, eh?

 

I reckon Goldwinger's right though, eh? A real lawyer wouldn't call a letter "slanderous" .

 

I think if you are a bystander in this mess, yeh should stay a bystander, eh? If the letter went to the council, it's bein' handled by professionals with trainin', and by other good scouters, and you should trust 'em to do their job.

 

If you are the parent of the boy, it's OK to vent here. As Calico points out, good scouters are often very critical of our fellows who behave badly. But then yeh need to take a breath and either listen to your attorney or listen to the good scouters in your son's program. We really can't offer yeh better advice than they can, eh?

 

Beavah

 

[EagleParent]

Thanks to all that have replied. I was deliberatly vague, but maybe too much so. This is a contensious issue before the troop committee (which I'm a member of)

 

Two issues: One is with the writer - for this the parents consulted a lawyer. Second, is with the troop leaders who didn't inform the parents (yes they did find out accidentally). Does BSA policy require and/or expect leaders to inform the parents in such a situation.

 

CalicoPenn has some very good questions:

 

Letter was written to a DAC. Letter writer is a ASM. Select group was SM,ASM, and committee member. No investigation was made, even though the most libelous part was admittedly hearsy. Apparently the SM, ASM, CM told the letter writer he was out of line but didn't ask him to retract or appologize. Now the parents have found out and want to know why they weren't informed of the written attack on their child. That's really the only beef the parents have with the troop. They are worried that they can't protect their child from further attacks (from the writer who has never liked the scout's family) or damage from the first one unless they are informed.

 

Personally I can't say I blame them, but does anyone know if the BSA has a policy on this type of situation?

 

 

 

 

[Beavah]

No, there's no BSA policy that applies here, beyond da Scout Oath and Law.

 

Troops are not under the direction of the BSA, though. The question is whether your Chartered Organization - the owner of the troop - has a policy. They might, eh?

 

Now, yeh seem to be sayin' that the parents have retained an attorney, presumably with an interest to takin' some kind of legal action against this ASM and the unit, and that attorney has told 'em they have a credible case. If there truly are real damages, that had to be a heck of a letter.

 

I cannot say this clearly enough. If that is really the case, this is no longer a matter for the troop committee. The CC needs to take this matter out of their hands and run, don't walk, to the COR and head of the chartered organization and to the BSA district executive. It should not be somethin' a committee of inexperienced parents is involved in or discussing AT ALL. You have a duty in this case to protect da Chartered Partner.

 

So EagleParent, yeh should call your CC today, right now, and have him call and meet with those three people, eh? IH, COR, DE. To the BSA District Exec (who are often young men), your CC has to use the magic words "the parents have retained a lawyer". This will probably cause the DE to kick it up the chain to your council's Scout Executive or Field Director. This is not a "sometime this month" meetin', eh? This is a "let's meet today or tomorrow" meeting.

 

As a committee, you step aside (unless your committee is somethin' like da board of elders for a church, where yeh have executive authority for the CO... but in that case, I reckon yeh wouldn't be askin' about this here ). What the CO should do is review the situation with da BSA and their own counsel, and act appropriately based on that, eh?

 

They will not report back to the committee. The committee will have no say. And, I reckon if it's handled well, there's a good possibility that either the ASM or the boy and his family will be removed from the unit. Either that, or they'll both be shocked and impressed by how seriously everyone is takin' it, and will back down to bein' regular human beings again.

 

In the interim, if there's some delay, under no circumstances should the boy and the ASM be present at any activity together. Tell the ASM to stay away, keep his mouth shut, and retain his own legal counsel.

 

Beavah

 

[evmori]

If I was the SM of this unit, I would inform the COR & request they remove this ASM from our roster. There is no call for this & the ASM was completely out of line.

[Eagle92]

Must ditto what Beavah. Had a very similar situation when I was a DE. Long story short I was told that it was a unit matter that had to be handled by the CO until a lawyer get involved. The it becomes a council problem.

 

This is a very serious matter and I wish you the best of luck.

[Eagle1982]

I have to agree with Beavah also. It sounds like something you should not want to be involved in, and you should let the professionals handle it.

[jtswestark]

And people wonder why good quality adults dont want to get involved today

As a SM, I cant tell you how many conversations Ive had over the years about particular Scouts with other leaders, and parents dont have any right to know what we are talking about in these private conversations. But when a leader goes and formally submits a written complaint to a higher level, thats a whole nother story.

 

You say the ASM has had issues with the family before. Either choice of putting the guy on a very firm warning or just go ahead and tell him it's time to move on would fit. I would also tell the parents you all are handling it and drop the issue. If they insist on going forth with anything, I would ask them to leave as well. This kind of thing can kill a troop if it lingers. Id be very cautious about the parents of the youth that conferred with the attorney. One who threatens to do something eventually will.

 

A word of caution out there, I personally have been threatened with a lawsuit, from a fellow leader no less. When I informed who I thought was my buddy, the DE, he jumped all over me. So you better be careful, were only a hair away from it any time we open our mouth and friends disappear very fast.

 

[Gold Winger]

I'd like to know what the boy allegedly did and why the ASM believed that he did it. From the story here, every just said, "Nah, Johnny couldn't have done that."

[nldscout]

If this letter was sent to the DAC, I would guess this has smething to do with Advancement, Eagle maybe.

 

This is hard ground to walk as he may beleive himself correct, then what?

 

[ScoutMomSD]

First thanks for bringing this to the board and sharing. My heart goes out to you.

 

It goes along with my theory - just because you can have kids doesnt mean you should or make you a good parent. When I see stupidity with adults I tell my eldest I have to give you the skills to protect you against their kids as we know they werent raised with our values. I cant fix the other childs family, but I can give you the skills to deal with them.

 

My biggest concern about scouting is communication between what I keep assuming are responsible adults.

 

I know you have reasons to keep the confidentiality but here is my input:

If its about any sexual issues including sexual preference, alleged impropriety with another child, male or female or anything of that nature, the folks doing the accusation should have been brought in IMMEDIATELY and spoken too. And the childs parents should be informed.

If its about stealing or bullying I would also have the same stance.

If its about a lesser evil, I would have brought in the parents together and tried to talk through it.

 

Seriously I am getting really tired of the issue of grown people not being able to talk to each other. Its like have the proverbial 500 lb gorilla in the room, get it out, get past it. It will STRENGTHEN the group. Going through adversity and FIXING issues should cement the bond of the pack and leadership and not blow it out of the water.

 

Once lawyers are involved in some ways its too late, but I would try to do a scout "arbitration".

 

Again good luck. I do not envy your position. And my heart goes out to the scout.

[Gold Winger]

There was a case in my district in which an alert Scouter wrote to the Eagle Board and claimed that an Eagle candidate was dealing drugs at his school. Of course, the Board refused to act without proof. The Scoutmaster claimed that it was an incredible story. The parents threatened a lawsuit. The boy got his Eagle and a few months later got swept up in a police operation, got convicted and went to jail.

 

Since this is the 21st century, the parents blamed the man who tried to keep their son from getting his Eagle.