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Title: Boy Scouts of America Must Pay $18.5 Million In Abuse Case
Source:
Associated Press
URL Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36746861
Published: Apr 24, 2010
Author: Associated Press
Post Date: 2010-04-24 12:41:33 by Brian S
Keywords: None
Views: 761
Comments: 3
PORTLAND, Ore. - A jury on Friday ordered the Boy Scouts of America to pay $18.5 million to a man sexually abused by a former assistant Scoutmaster in what is believed to be the largest such award against the organization. Lawyers for Kerry Lewis had asked the jury to award at least $25 million to punish the Boy Scouts for what the jury had already agreed in the first phase of the trial was reckless and outrageous conduct. They also noted the Boy Scouts had never apologized to Lewis, who said Friday at a news conference that the verdict shows that "big corporations can't be above the law." Lewis added that an apology "would mean something to me, but I'm not expecting it." The jury decided on April 13 that the Boy Scouts were negligent for allowing former assistant Scoutmaster Timur Dykes to associate with Scouts, including Lewis, after Dykes admitted to a Scouts official in 1983 that he had molested 17 boys. The jury awarded Lewis $1.4 million in compensatory damages with that verdict and agreed the Boy Scouts of America were liable for punitive damages to be determined in the second phase of the trial that ended Thursday. Boy Scouts officials declined to comment on details of the case because other cases are pending, but issued a statement saying it maintains a "rigorous" system to screen Scout leaders. "The Boy Scouts of America has always stood against child abuse of any kind," it said. The case was the first of six filed against the Boy Scouts in the same court in Oregon, with at least one other separate case pending. If mediation fails to settle the next cases, they also could go to trial. Significant award The amount of the damages surprised Patrick Boyle, editor of the Youth Today newspaper and author of a book about sex abuse within the Scouts. "That's a lot of money. This is by far the biggest award against the Scouts for sex abuse, probably by several times," Boyle said. The award is also significant, he said, because it is only against the national Boy Scouts organization and is not divided among any of its local councils or other defendants. Kelly Clark and Paul Mones, the attorneys for Lewis, told the jury the Boy Scouts were nearly a $1 billion corporation that could well afford punitive damages intended to deter them from similar conduct in the future. Clark and Mones said Friday after the verdict that publicity about the case also could act as a deterrent. "They've always settled. And they're silent. No one hears because it does not see the light of day," Mones said. "What we saw here in Portland really pulled back the covers on the Boy Scouts of America, and what it did to cover up." During the first phase of the trial, Clark and Mones introduced more than 1,000 files the Scouts kept on suspected child molesters from 1965-85 as evidence the organization should have put a sex abuse prevention program into place decades ago. The Scouts executive now in charge of those files admitted they had never been evaluated or analyzed to help design or determine the effectiveness of a prevention program that is now in place. A number of witnesses testified for the Scouts during the second phase of the trial that they participated in a training and prevention program since at least the late 1980s. None could say why the Scouts had not yet made the "youth protection training" program mandatory.
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#1. To: Brian S (#0)
youth protection training is mandatory for all scout leaders.
Being a Republican means you get to choose your own reality.
Best not to have boy organizations in the blue areas.
----------------------------------------------------------- No, I dont think this has anything to do with the location. The Boy Scouts simply needs a "regime change" because of the One World "Progressives" in its rank in ALL LOCATIONS, "blue" and "red". I think "Progressives" are behind this sexual abuse for two reasons. 1. "Progressives" are by nature bloody handed treasonous perverts, both sexually and politically. 2. "Progressives" want to DESTROY a youth organization that they originally founded but that no longer goes along with their program for the most part. (Republican "Progressive" Theodore Roosevelt and "Progressive" Environut Earnest Thomson Seton had a lot to do with American Scouting's founding 100 years ago. Scouting in America however came under the rule of the parents of the Scouts for the most part rather than the government school system as it did in other countries resulting in the BSA's more conservative interpretations of the Scout oath and law, and its more free market oriented Merit Badge system.)
#2. To: Brian S (#0)
Toss: ADL,CAIR and the Vatican into the pit they belong in.
#3. To: WhiteSands (#2)
The Fed EXPOSED!!! The FARO RESERVE BANK!!!
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