www.OregonLive.com
May 23, 2010

BY LES ZAITZ and NICOLE DUNGCA 

The Boy Scouts‘ effort to protect their young members from sexual abuse had large gaps from the start and has significantly fallen behind modern practices.

Videos intended to alert youth about potential abuse don’t warn that Scout leaders could be molesters, despite an 80-year record of just such scenarios.

Few of the 1.2 million adults volunteering in Scouts have been required to take training that the Boy Scouts offer.
 

Checking those volunteers for past criminal conduct wasn’t started until 2003, and each person is checked only once. Thousands who started before then weren’t included. Finally, in 2008, the Scouts required checks on everyone renewing their annual registration as a Scout volunteer.

The Scouts ignored their own experts’ advice to study and learn from thousands of confidential files on abusers.

A Portland jury with unprecedented access to those files sent a message last month that the Boy Scouts of America must do a better job of protecting the nearly three million kids in their programs. In a civil trial, jurors found the Scouts liable for allowing a former assistant Scoutmaster, Timur Dykes, to continue working with – and abusing – a Boy Scout after Dykes pleaded guilty to attempted sexual abuse of young boys.

"They never said once that ‘We have a problem,’" said Margaret Ormsbee, one of the jurors. "It felt to jurors that maybe they weren’t taking this seriously."

The jurors slammed the Scouts with the largest verdict in the group’s 100-year history. They awarded $18.5 million for abuse by Dykes, who admitted molesting 17 boys just as the youth protection program was being developed.

National Scout executives declined interviews or to respond in detail to two letters offering them factual statements to verify.

"There are many inaccuracies," the Boy Scouts said in a statement last Thursday. They said they didn’t have time to adequately address the statements and felt responses on many subjects would be inappropriate because of pending litigation.

The Scouts, who serve 41,000 youth in Oregon, face another 10 lawsuits in the state over child abuse.

The Scouts defend their efforts.

"The Boy Scouts of America has been a pioneer in building multiple layers of safeguards into its programs so that local Scout troop can be as safe a place as possible," the Scouts said in a statement to The Oregonian.

But Scout documents and sworn testimony by Scout executives show precious little of it mandated, and none of it audited.

Local Scout leaders are free to use the "youth protection program" as they see fit.

That was stunning to Portland jurors, who listened to weeks of testimony in a case pitting the national Scouts against a man molested by Dykes.

The biggest thing is that even in 2010, things were not mandatory," said Ormsbee. "Even after 60, 70, 80 years of kids being abused, it’s still not strictly mandatory."

She said the Scouts have good written material and should require its use.

"This should be mandatory training for every volunteer and not just registered volunteers," Ormsbee said. "There are far more unregistered volunteers. This should be required for any adult who’s going to be around Scouts."

On Thursday, the Scouts said in a statement to The Oregonian that as of June 1, "youth protection training will be mandatory for every adult volunteer and it must be taken every two years."

The Scouts developed youth protection material in the face of civil cases and increasing publicity about abuse within Scouting.

"When we began in 1987, we didn’t know anything about child sex abuse," said Larry Potts, a former top Scout executive in a sworn deposition.

The Scouts recruited prominent experts in child abuse to help, but they weren’t asked to design a program to protect Scouts. Instead, according to depositions, their job was to review brochures, articles and videos put together by the Scouts.

Paul Mones, a Portland attorney in the recent Scout case and has represented abuse victims for 30 years, reviewed the two videos used in the program. "None of them – not one of them – ever mentioned a Boy Scout, showed a Boy Scout or had a Boy Scout scenario," Mones said.

A Boy Scout flier for parents on how to talk to their child about abuse advised, "Tell your children that an adult whom they know and trust, perhaps someone in a position of authority (like a babysitter, an uncle, a teacher, or even a policeman) might try to do something like this."

The youth protection effort did provoke new rules in Scouting to minimize the chances a Scout would be abused.

Beginning in 1987, the Scouts required two adults attend every Scout event. In 1991, the Scouts mandated that no adult could be alone with a Scout. The national organization doesn’t audit whether those rules are obeyed.

The Scouts also say they warded off potential offenders by starting criminal background checks, beginning with employees in 1994 and expanded to new volunteers in 2003.

The Scouts said in 2008 they expanded criminal background checks to include "all volunteers" but wouldn’t explain if that included volunteers already participating and volunteers not formally registered with the Scouts.

Scout officials also wouldn’t answer whether volunteers are checked more than once.

Experts say once isn’t enough.

One of the most prominent leaders in Portland area Scouting logged 39 years of respectable service in Oregon and elsewhere before he was caught in the Department of Homeland Security’s "Operation Predator" program in 2005.

At the time of his arrest, Douglas Sovereign Smith, former executive director of the Columbia Pacific Council, had been in charge of the Boy Scouts’ national program to protect children from sexual abuse. He pleaded guilty to receiving and distributing child pornography and was sentenced to eight years in federal prison.

The case produced no evidence that Smith victimized Scouts but showed what child-protection advocates already know – the importance of vigilance.

Kristen Anderson of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children said her organization recommends annual record checks. Congress created the center as a pilot project to give youth organizations one place to turn for centralized checks. Many of the country’s largest youth organizations signed on. The Boy Scouts didn’t.

Anderson said regular checks at the national level can turn up conduct that occurs after a volunteer has signed up. She also said molesters are sophisticated about evading detection.

"There are percentages of individuals who will use false names, who will apply to volunteer in states that are different than where their criminal history occurs," Anderson said.

In California, the Salvation Army checks the records of both employees and volunteers every two years. Anne Calvo, child safety consultant with Salvation Army’s Western operations, testified such care deters molesters.

"I like to believe that they know that we have these safeguards in place and so they stay away," she testified in a deposition two years ago. "They do chat amongst themselves and they share the organizations that are easy to have access to children without much screening."

The Scouts insist they have rigorous screening of volunteers, but as with much in Scouting, the process has been voluntary.

Some experts say the Scouts did not take advantage of a significant source of information for protecting Scouts – their own "ineligible volunteer files." They have collected such records since about 1920, documenting the name and conduct of Scout leaders banned for child abuse, including 98 in Oregon from 1971 to 2005.

The files are kept locked away. The Scouts said in a statement to The Oregonian that said disclosing the files "could have a very negative impact on efforts to protect our youth from those who should not be involved in youth activities."

Nonetheless, some experts say that unparalleled record would be valuable for evaluating the Scout protection program and for identifying patterns suggesting a molester was at work. They say the files also should have been more scrupulously mined to catch abusers returning to Scouting ranks.

One of those who saw the research promise of those secret files was David Finkelhor, a New Hampshire professor specializing in child abuse research. The founder of the Crimes Against Children Research Center, he served 20 years on the national Scout expert panel on child abuse.

"I suggested that there might be some utility in having somebody review those files as a way of trying to ascertain the effects their youth protection program was having," Finkelhor testified last year.

Other experts on the panel made the same suggestion. Finkelhor said he was frustrated that the Scouts wouldn’t crack open the files.

He’s not alone.

"What struck everyone was that the Scouts simply weren’t using their information," said Orsmbee, the Portland juror. "It was really disturbing."

She said the Scouts could use their files to profile Scout abusers. "Are they single? Are they married? How do they groom their victims? Are they younger? Older?" Orsmbee said.

Dr. Eli Newberger, a Massachusetts pediatrician and national leader in standards for youth organizations, also analyzed the Scouts’ practices and reviewed their internal records, acting on behalf of Scout victims.

"That sense was not made of these data to better serve children raises serious questions about the intentions of national BSA leadership," said Newberger.

Shortly before the recent Portland trial, the Scouts hired a University of Virginia researcher to examine the confidential files. She testified the files held little research potential.

But Newberger said the files also reveal instances when the Scouts inexplicably allowed an abuser to continue working in Scouts.

"The record is replete with violations of ethical principles and standards of care for children that led to tragic consequences for children and their families," Newberger wrote in assessing the confidential records.

Ormsbee said jurors were disturbed by episodes when the Scouts discovered but didn’t reject a suspected or proven abuser. In several instances, abusers were put on probation instead of being banned.

"We saw a lot of cases from the ’60s and ’70s where they were reported as abusers. In the 1990s, they’re still there," Ormsbee said. "We’re wondering why they were not kicked out."

– Les Zaitz
–

Nicole Dungca

www.OregonLive.com
May 22nd, 2010

By LES ZAITZ and NICOLE DUNGCA

When a parent heard that William E. Tobiassen, a longtime Scout leader in Corvallis, was sexually abusing one of his troop members, she alerted Scout officials.

Nothing changed.

For two more years, Tobiassen, an insurance agent with sons of his own, abused the boy.

The abuse was exposed only when the teenager told a counselor and then police what had happened. Even then, internal memos show, the Scouts executive overseeing Tobiassen didn’t want to ban him from Scouting until there were formal charges.

The episode from 1984 wasn’t the only instance when Oregon Scout leaders failed to act on trouble in their ranks.

Secret files obtained by The Oregonian from 1971 to 1991 contain no record that Scout leaders alerted authorities to adults suspected of child abuse in at least 11 instances in Oregon.

In all, 46 people were booted from Scouting in Oregon in those years, most based on police or media reports of suspected or proven cases of child molestation.

Scout leaders insist they take appropriate measures to protect children.

A Portland jury recently concluded otherwise.

In that case, jurors considered 1,000 confidential Scout files from 1965 to 1985 to judge the Scouts’ liability. Only once before in the country has a jury seen such files, but never before in the volume or unrestricted form provided Portland jurors. The jury subsequently awarded Kerry Lewis $18.5 million to punish the Scouts for abuse he suffered at the hands of a Scout leader.

But the award also was meant to jolt the Scouts.

"We were trying to send a message," said Margaret Ormsbee, one of the jurors. "It seemed to most of us they were putting their PR and reputation above children’s safety."

The Portland case focused a white hot light on Boy Scout practices. Critics say the Scouting organization, headquartered in Texas, has never adequately responded to sex abuse within its ranks as the Catholic church finally has now done.

Nearly 25 years ago, the Scouts designed a program they said would protect youth from sex abuse, but it has been largely voluntary for the 1.2 million men and women guiding Scouts across the country. The Scouts have no record of who has taken the training. They haven’t assessed how widely used it is or whether it works.

Scouts leaders in Texas headquarters won’t discuss their program or Scout child abuse. Historically, they have talked only grudgingly when they had to – in court or through lawyers.

The Scouts appeared ready to break their silence, scheduling an interview with The Oregonian and seeking written questions they promised to answer. One day before the interview, the Scouts canceled out on both.

Instead, they provided a two-page description of their abuse-prevention program and a chronology of their efforts.

Scout executives in Oregon were little more forthcoming after getting written questions asking how they protect Oregon Scouts from sexual abuse. The largest unit, based in Portland, responded with a one-page letter, the Eugene unit declined comment, and the Medford unit didn’t answer at all.

"We make the Boy Scouts of America’s youth protection training programs for youth, parents and volunteers readily available, and we strongly support participation in such programs," wrote Matthew Devore, Scout executive at the Cascade Pacific Council. The council serves 32,471 boys.

Ormsbee said jurors were troubled the Scouts didn’t concede the seriousness of their record of child abuse stretching back nearly a century. "We all thought it was absolutely incomprehensible that the Scouts didn’t realize this was a problem," Ormsbee said.

Ormsbee said she had nightmares for weeks after reading "about awful things that happened over and over and over" in the Scout files.

Those "awful things" are documented in "ineligible volunteer files" created at Texas headquarters and kept in locked storage.

The files typically include notes from local Scout leaders, relying on internal inquiries, police or court records, and even press clippings. Scout leaders have been banned for abusing Scouts, other children from school or church, or their own children.

The master list is meant to keep offenders from returning to Scouting. Local officials never see the files but are advised by headquarters when a particular volunteer can’t be registered as a Scout leader.
But in Oregon, that hasn’t always kept abusers away.

In 1982, Ken J. Drury was convicted in Deschutes County of sexual abuse.

Drury went on to participate in Scouting activities in Lane County.

Four years later, when Eugene-area Scout officials heard rumors of Drury’s criminal past, they wrote national headquarters for direction, noting that Drury "seems to have nothing more to do than travel around attaching himself to Scouting."

According to the confidential files, national Scout officials prepared to add Drury to the list but advised local Scout leaders that they "would not refuse registration" to Drury until they had more information.

An Oregon State Police officer supplied the necessary details, noting that the 1982 victim was a 16-year-old boy Drury was returning from a Scout outing.

Drury was officially banned from Scouting in November 1986.

He died in 2001.

National leaders in 1986 urged the Portland Scout council to drop cubmaster Carleton "Tim" Coffey "in a kind way" when they learned he had been convicted the year before of sexually abusing a young girl.

When national leaders learned later that Coffey was still in Scouting, they pressed again that he be ushered out. "This individual’s record is such that this could cause serious problems for the Boy Scouts of America should any further legal matters develop," according to an April 1988 letter from a national official.

The Portland council finally banned Coffey, who died in 1999.

The Oregon files also reveal that Scout leaders didn’t always tell police when they discovered a potential molester.

Under Oregon law, Scout executives aren’t required to report their suspicions to authorities as are teachers, doctors and others. Scout leaders were advised by national headquarters of their legal right to keep such information confidential.

"In the event that your jurisdiction does not require reporting, make sure that the individual making the allegation understands that the local council has no such requirement and does not intend to report the incident to authorities," said written instructions as read during a deposition of a top Scout executive.

William Tobiassen was one the Scouts spared from reporting to police.

He had been a Scout leader for more than a decade in Corvallis. He was active in politics, helping the local district attorney in a political campaign.

In 1982, Scout executives were told he was abusing a teen in his troop. The parent of another Scout tipped off Scout leaders. She testified later that they "downplayed" her information and said they would take care of it. They didn’t.

Two years later, police did act on the information. Tobiassen was convicted of sex abuse in 1984 and banned from Scouting.

Scouts were also slow to act following a report that assistant Scoutmaster Roy S. Wilson, who slept nude when camping, had straddled a Scout in his tent during a 1985 backpacking trip and insisted on providing a back rub.

The boy’s mother subsequently complained to Scout leaders.

A confidential Scout report drafted several months after the mother’s complaint recounted the boy’s description of how Wilson’s "muscles were very tense and his eyes bulged out."

Wilson told The Oregonian last week that he was dressed when he gave the back rub and that he didn’t abuse the boy. Still, local officials declined his offer to help with a 1985 summer camp, citing his "past background."

That may have been a reference to excerpts in his Scout file from a medical report that a worried doctor shared with Scout leaders. The doctor noted that Wilson, who was also a Lutheran minister, had "begun to turn to very young teenagers, 14 and 16 years old, as his main support system" and engaged in activities "there were not healthy for anyone involved."

Wilson said he participated with three troops at once, without registering as a volunteer. An internal Scout memo said Wilson was told to leave Scouting after the camping incident. But Wilson told The Oregonian he was ejected from just one of the troops and continued to work with the other two until months later, when he was formally banned from Scouting. He was added to the national list in 1987

"It was some time before the council did anything," Wilson said. "I think they were very sloppy."

He criticized the organization for ineffective controls.

"People are put on their list proscribing working with Boy Scouts any further without any checking into realities of the situation, and people are taken off the list despite the fact of solid evidence that they are a continuing danger," Wilson said.

Sixteen years after the back rub episode, police arrested Wilson in a child sex abuse case in Tillamook. He was convicted and is now a registered sex offender.

In 1974, Scout leaders confronted James F. Hogan over reports he had been kissing and hugging boys he oversaw through a troop sponsored by the Portland Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The file recounted one formerly "enthusiastic" Scout’s reaction to a meeting with Hogan. The boy "took off his uniform and threw it and his books into the closet and has not taken them out to this day," the internal report said.

The file said Hogan had repeated questionable contact with Scouts, but the file contains no record that Scouts reported him to police.

They did ban Hogan from Scouting – but only for a time. In 1981,

church leaders asked that Hogan be reinstated because they concluded the earlier accusations against him weren’t true.

The Scouts relented, and restored Hogan as a Scout volunteer. Nine years later, they put him back on the list after he abused two boys he met at the church and pleaded guilty to sodomy.

Hogan told The Oregonian in an email that he didn’t have much memory of how the Scouts handled his case.

"I do take full responsibility for my actions and carry a heavy burden of pain, sorrow and regret both for those young men who have been injured and also for my wife, children and grandchildren who are re-injured each time these things are brought forth," Hogan wrote. 

On Friday, church officials issued a statement about child-protection measures taken in the 30 years since the Hogan case:

"As in society at large, there is today a better recognition of just how manipulative and deceitful perpetrators of abuse can be. That fact, along with a deeper understanding of the impact such abuse can have on victims, has led the Church to establish a 24-hour helpline, to provide extensive training for local leaders on recognizing abuse, to mandate compliance with reporting laws, to provide professional counseling for victims and to adopt stern methods for dealing with perpetrators."

In Southern Oregon, a high school dean and Scout leader was banned from Scouting for associating with a known sex offender. A local volunteer asked about the Scouts’ procedures in such matters, and a national executive wrote that "no public knowledge is made of any information which we have which would destroy anyone’s reputation."

Such concern over reputation was standard for the Scouts, according to the national executive who managed registration of volunteers.

"Our philosophy has been that we are not trying in any way to hurt this person’s reputation or their standing in the community. Simply to make certain they are not registered in Scouting," testified Paul Ernst in a 1986 deposition.

He has since retired, and Scout officials in Texas wouldn’t answer whether that practice continues.

Past behavior wasn’t always detected because the Scouts didn’t start subjecting volunteers to criminal background checks until 2003. In the Oregon case files, word of criminal conduct came either from police or newspaper headlines.

In the 1980s, Oregon State Police Sgt. Ron Jones provided the Boy Scouts in Southern Oregon information he said should be sufficient to ban a Scout leader. Jones, who died in 2003, also was a top Scout executive in Medford.

In 1987, Jones alerted Scouts that Jay D. Mitchell, a Scout leader from Grants Pass, had been accused of sodomy and sex abuse involving children who weren’t Scouts.

Once Mitchell pleaded guilty to four counts of sodomy, Jones urged the Scouts to act. He said Mitchell was a "dangerous offender, which means simply that if he had not been arrested, his activities would be more and more violent."

The Scouts officially added Mitchell to the blacklist seven months after he was convicted of sexually abusing a child.

Mitchell couldn’t be located for comment.

Tim Kosnoff, a Seattle attorney who has represented abused Scouts, said his clients have never been offered treatment by the Scouts.

"It’s like a failure to administer first aid to a Scout who’s broken his leg," Kosnoff said.

The Cascade Pacific Council "offers both individual and group counseling when appropriate," said Devore, the Scout executive. He wouldn’t elaborate.

The national Scouts’ federal tax return for 2008 doesn’t list any expense for counseling or therapy. It did list $9.9 million on public relations, which, Scout officials say, includes internal communications.

The focus on public relations troubles those who believe the Scouts should be accountable for what has happened.

Dr. Eli Newberger, a Massachusetts pediatrician recognized as an expert on child abuse, is one of the few outsiders who have had access to the Scouts’ secret files. He has testified on behalf of Scouting victims, based in part on reviewing files as recent as 2005.

Newberger concluded the Scouts fell "far short" of adequately protecting children.

"Bureaucratic prerogatives may have trumped the interests of children and secrecy hid evidence of a continuing threat to the welfare of children," Newberger wrote.

James F. Hogan
Born

: June 1937

Scout positions:

Cubmaster of Pack 406 in Portland, involved with group from Post 812, cubmaster for Unit 3112

History:

When a Portland Cub Scout returned from an overnight stay at cubmaster James Hogan’s house, he told his parents that Hogan had fondled him over his sleeping bag, according to a 1974 letter a local Scout official sent to a Scout executive.

Hogan wrote an apologetic letter to the Boy Scouts that same year, but he was placed on the national organization’s blacklist in June 1974. He was rejected when he tried to re-register in 1978.

Then, in 1981, Hogan found a way back in. After a counselor affiliated with the Mormon Church insisted that Hogan’s physicality had been misinterpreted, the Scouts registered Hogan on a probationary basis, again as cubmaster.

In 1989, Hogan pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a juvenile relative and two boys he met through his position as a janitor of the church. Those two victims filed a civil suit against the church, which was settled.

 As recently as 2008, another Portland man came forward with a lawsuit alleging Hogan sexually abused him while employed by the church. The case was settled for undisclosed terms.

Where is he now?

Portland

Born:

January 17, 1934

Scout positions

: Scout Commissioner, 1986 Scouter of the Year for Eastern Oregon District

History

: On the outside, Franklin Mathias seemed an exemplary Scout leader.

But an emotional Mathias abruptly resigned from the organization in June 1987,  according to official Scout documents. Just months later, he was arrested on sexual abuse charges involving at least five young boys. News reports said some of the abuse allegedly took place on Boy Scout outings.

In 1988, he was convicted of one count of first-degree sexual abuse and three counts of second-degree sexual abuse.

Letters show Scout leaders immediately sensed the legal implications.

"So far, we are not involved and do not have any lawsuits pending against us," wrote one scout executive. "For the time being, I guess we wait and keep our fingers crossed."

Where is he now?

Jefferson

Gerald Wayne Gunter 
Born:

January 27, 1949 

Scout positions:

Involved with Troop Number 491 in Jackson County, volunteer for Ashland’s Troop 112

History:

In the summer of 1985, the National Office received word of a Scout’s mother who had accused Gunter of sexually abusing her son.

In September, Gunter pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual abuse charges and was sentenced to five years probation.

In July 1985, Kathryn Janssen, a longtime attorney for the Scouts, wrote the National Office about a civil suit filed on behalf of the boy against Gunter and the Scouts. She noted "warning signs of several other potential suits."

Gunter’s case was settled two years later. Terms were not disclosed.

Where is he now?

Ashland

 –

Les Zaitz

,

Nicole Dungca

An Open Letter to Youth Organizations, Churches, and Schools.
By Kelly Clark
April 2010

After six weeks of trial against the Boy Scouts of America—resulting in, as far as I know, the largest child abuse verdict in American history on behalf of one plaintiff—I am being asked repeatedly to blog about the lessons from the trial.  There are of course many, and some of the most important have to do with Kerry Lewis, my client and now friend, who stood so courageously and told his story so clearly.  But the lessons from the other end of the evidence—about what happens when good youth organizations forget their first principles and react to allegations of child abuse by keeping secrets—is what I want to write about first. So here is an open letter to youth organizations; here is what I hope they learn:

Dear Youth Organization:

I write this to you because you have taken on the great task of working with children.  Whether you are a school, a church, an athletic league, a dance company or a day care center, whether you are a public or private entity, whether you are a new organization or have been around for decades, you are doing good work. You are helping our young people to grow up, and you are doing your best. No doubt.  So I respectfully offer some of the lessons of the long trial in Portland, Oregon against the Boy Scouts.  Please learn these lessons, so that kids will be safe and so that you don’t make the same mistakes that too many other youth organizations have made.

So, while it is all fresh in our minds, let’s consider the lessons from this trial against the Boy Scouts of America—once America’s most trusted youth organization– as the evidence came in to a very attentive and unusually well-educated jury:

1.     You Cannot Keep Secrets About Hidden Dangers to Children.
“Youth organizations must do everything feasible to protect children, and cannot keep secrets about hidden dangers to children.”  This simple theme was the foundation for our entire case. It seemed to us—my co-counsel Paul Mones and I– to be a fair and general principle to which any youth organization would agree.  We had planned to go from that principle to showing that BSA had not adhered to the common sense rules.   Yet numerous times during the trial we were stunned to hear witnesses for the BSA who would refuse to acknowledge this basic idea. Not refuse to acknowledge that the BSA violated this idea– we expected that.  But refuse to acknowledge the basic principle itself!   The message given to the jury by such quibbling was that the BSA was playing word games and putting qualifiers on the question of safety to children. 

The fact is, the BSA has known for decades that it had a serious child abuse problem. They kept interior confidential files on the problem since the 1920’s, and certainly by the 1950’s and 60’s knew that the thousands of files (the evidence was that by 1985 the BSA had at least 3000- 4000 pedophile files)—representing thousands or tens of thousands of children abused–  meant that their program was being targeted by pedophiles. 

Yet, the BSA still refused to admit in open court the very obvious truth that it had, and has, a child abuse problem.  Several key witnesses repeatedly argued about or qualified the simple phrase “problem” in response to direct questions. It was like listening to an alcoholic or addict refuse to admit that he or she “has a problem” and needs help, when everyone around sees the chaos and insanity of substance addiction.  The jury saw this fierce and calculated denial of the problem, and quite apparently did not like it.

So the message is simple: youth organizations cannot keep secrets about hidden dangers to children. Parents and the community have a right to know if there is a risk to children.  You would give a clear warning about food poisoning among your kids, or about a dangerous crosswalk near your building.  The fact that your warning might have to be about an embarrassing problem with child abuse within your organization does not change the obligation to warn. Not even for the esteemed Boy Scouts of America.  That is one of the key lessons of this trial.

2.    As your knowledge increases, so does your responsibility. 
Oregon law, as is true of the law in most states—as well as common sense– says that whether a person acted “reasonably” under the circumstances depends upon what the person knew about the dangers at issue.  A seaside hotel owner who knows that people regularly get caught in dangerous ocean undertows right in front of the hotel has a different obligation to warn guests than that same hotel owner might have to warn about a freak and unforeseeable storm.  It is just common sense.  So, as the BSA over the years and decades gathered its knowledge about the pedophile problem within Scouting, it was no longer good enough simply to keep a list of the pedophiles so they could not come back into the organization.  At some point, the BSA had an obligation to take and use that information to make the organization safer. If the BSA headquarters had been filled with $100 bills instead of the names of little boys, and 4000 times over a 5 decade period thieves had broken in to steal money, the BSA would not simply have kept a list of the thieves to prevent them from getting into the building. The BSA would have changed its security systems to prevent new thieves from getting in!  That simple analogy perfectly describes the BSA’s response to its child abuse problem.

So the second lesson for youth organizations from the BSA trial is painfully obvious– as your knowledge increases so does your responsibility.  Is it a good thing to keep data about your safety issues?  Of course. Is it smart to make sure that a known pedophile cannot get back into your organization?  Obviously.  But that, in and of itself, is not enough to fulfill your duty to protect children.  You must look at what changes are necessary to make the organization safer.

3.    You must always put the safety of children ahead of the interests of the organization.
If there is a common thread that I have seen in advocating for child abuse victims against a variety of institutions of trust—churches, schools, foster care agencies, and now the BSA—it is this:  there seems to be an idea that the work of the organization is so important, its goals so noble, that there might be times when it is necessary to “keep a lid on this problem.”  This, of course, is the misguided historical response that produced the ongoing scandals in the Catholic Church.  But it goes way beyond that particular institution of trust.  So many youth organizations have great goals and purposes.  They do good work. They help children and help the community.  And so, when trouble comes along, their first instinct is to protect the work. And if this means keeping a potentially embarrassing problem quiet—even at the risk of keeping secrets about child abuse—they reactively take that route.  While that may be an understandable reaction, it is always disastrous, sooner or later.  The old idea that “the ends justify the means” can never apply to a sluggish response to child abuse, and too many good organizations fall prey to the temptation to protect the organization.   The safety of children, and whatever it takes to accomplish that—including blaring trumpet warnings if that is necessary—must always take precedence over the reputation of the organization.  That is lesson 3 from the BSA trial.

4.    When it goes bad, accept responsibility and apologize.
It is a timeless truth that runs through all societies at all times and places, but especially through the religions and ethical systems of Western culture: apologies heal.  This truth is central to our legal system as well, even to the point that it is an expectation in the criminal justice system that someone who is found to have broken the community’s rules will apologize—in part, at least because we understand that it will be helpful for the victim.  But it is not limited to the criminal justice courts: we expect apologies from those who have harmed others, and those who have knowingly failed to protect those in their care—especially institutions of trust such as churches, schools and youth organizations like the Boy Scouts. 

And all this is especially true for victims of child sexual abuse, who so often believe that, somehow the abuse was their fault, that they should have done something to stop it, or they should have immediately told someone—all beliefs which the mental health professionals tell us are almost universal in child abuse victims.  So when they receive an acknowledgement of responsibility and a sincere apology from those responsible for their abuse— the perpetrator of the abuse, an institution that could have prevented the abuse, or both—it is incredibly healing and empowering.  Suddenly, in one moment, the survivor realizes that his or her core beliefs about this life-altering event—“it was my fault; I am fundamentally flawed because of what I did and did not do about this”—are all wrong, and that the person or institution who is factually and morally responsible for the abuse is owning up to what happened. The weight and burden of this wrong, which has been on the shoulders of the victim for so many years or even decades, is lifted off of the victim and placed where it belongs.

This is such basic common sense and human experience that it is hard to understand why institutions of trust—such as the Boy Scouts, the Catholic Church, and others— are so reluctant to make this simple and profound gesture.  Of course, it involves the acceptance of responsibility, and too often that acceptance is slow to come for an organization that prides itself on the nobility of its purpose. It is, after all, hard for someone who thinks he is a hero, or divinely inspired, to admit that he failed utterly in one of his prime responsibilities and is now being called to account for it.  We have seen this for at least a decade in watching the Catholic Church come to grips with the magnitude of its child abuse problem—to accept that it even had a particular problem, to acknowledge that the Church badly failed in its historic response to that problem, and to make unequivocal apologies to those who were damaged by those failures. 

This same dynamic of denial seems to be true for the BSA—which, apart from the specific facts of this case in Portland, continues to deny publicly that it has historically had a serious child abuse problem—different both in type and frequency from that in society at large.  Not once during the decades that we have litigated against the BSA, in dozens of cases, whether settled or tried to a jury,  has the BSA offered even a simple apology to any of our clients.  And we know of no circumstance in which the BSA ever has issued an apology to the thousands of boys who were abused by Scout leaders.

I want to say in conclusion, again, that the Boy Scouts of America is a great organization. Our boys need good, strong role models to learn the art and habits of living an honorable life as they move into manhood.  Lord knows our society needs more young men of integrity, purpose and faith.  BSA is in a position as it enters its second century to play a unique role in shaping young men.  It is an awesome responsibility.  We can only hope that the leadership of this organization steps back, moves past the shock and shame of a jury’s stern rebuke, and takes stock of what is truly all about.  If it does, then it can move to reclaim society’s trust and admiration. If it does not, if it continues to shoot the messengers—lawyers, plaintiffs, juries, the news media– then it will lose its credibility, it will become a shell of what it once was and again could be, and it will eventually slide into irrelevance. 
 

April 23, 2010

Portland, Ore—A jury today found the Boy Scouts of America liable for punitive damages for the sexual abuse of a then 12 year old boy in the 1980’s, returning a verdict of  $18.5million in punitive damages—having last week returned a verdict of $ 1.4 in general compensatory damages. The trial lasted nearly 6 weeks.   Under Oregon law, 60% of a punitive damages award goes to the State of Oregon crime victims’ fund—since the public policy purpose of punitive damages is to improve community safety. 

“This is a tremendous win and a vindication of the truth about what happened to this boy,” said trial attorneys Kelly Clark and Paul Mones, co-counsel for the plaintiff, in a prepared statement.  “The lessons of this case are that it is wrong for a youth organization to put the interests of the organization before the safety of the children,” they added.  “Child abuse is always a devastating poison in the soul of any child, and this jury clearly recognized the profound impact that this abuse had on this young boy, and wanted to send a signal that a jury in Portland, Oregon will not tolerate any youth organization—even the venerated Boy Scouts of America—that keeps secrets about dangers to children.  We are very proud of him for standing up for himself and for all abuse victims. If one child is saved from abuse because of this trial, it will be a win with lasting significance.” 

The plaintiff, Kerry Lewis, now 38, had been known before the trial only as “Jack Doe 4”—there are a total of 6 men who are suing for abuse by the same perpetrator—but during the trial, he allowed his name to be used publicly.  He was abused on 6 separate occasions when he was a Cub Scout and Boy Scout, at age 10-12. “I’m grateful for the chance to tell my story,” he said, “and it was bottled up inside me for too long.  Now I get to go on and finish my healing. This trial was a great way to start the process of putting all this behind me, so I can focus on being a good man, a good friend, and a good father.”

Highlights of the trial included the presentation, for the first time before any jury, of over 1000 confidential files—totaling nearly 20,000 pages of documents—concerning adult Scout leaders from 1965-85 who had been accused of abusing Scouts.  The trial court had ordered the documents produced in December, but the Scouts appealed to the Oregon Supreme Court, which on Feb 19 refused to hear the appeal or to block the order. The BSA finally produced the documents on March 2, and the trial commenced on March 15. 

“When it came to child sexual abuse, the BSA motto was not ‘be prepared’ but rather was ‘be quiet,’” Clark and Mones commented.  The plaintiff argued that the confidentiality of these sexual abuse files, and the refusal of the Scouts to warn parents of the known dangers of abuse in Scouting, amounted to a cover-up, driven by the BSA’s desire to keep up its membership.  In that regard, the plaintiff produced a surprise witness during the last week of the main trial, Larry O’Connor, a lifelong Scouter from Alaska and a former professional Scout executive,  who testified that, throughout the 1970’s the BSA deliberately inflated membership numbers all over the country through a mechanism called “ghost units”—Scout Troops that only existed on paper. The inflated numbers, Clark and Mones argued, was evidence of the motive for covering up the abuse problem—the desire not to lose members and financial support.   In closing argument, Clark compared this to the cover-up in the Catholic Church of sex abuse by pedophile priests.

The plaintiff’s case also included evidence about what other youth organizations were doing in the 1980’s to protect children, especially the Big Brothers and Sisters, which had aggressive child abuse training and education programs in place by the 1980’s, while the Boy Scouts of America had not begun similar programs.  The plaintiff had been abused in 83 and 84 by an Assistant Scoutmaster named Timur Dykes, despite that Dykes had admitted to Troop leaders in January 1983 that he had molested 17 Scouts.  The plaintiff’s parents were never warned about his dangerousness, and that failure, according to plaintiff’s attorneys, led to further abuse, including of plaintiff.

The punitive damages phase of the trial highlighted the BSA’s surprisingly rich financial statements—with nearly $1 billion in assets, including $660 million in unrestricted funds, annual revenues of $400 million, and a $45 million art collection.  The plaintiff’s lawyers during the punitive damages phase of the trial highlighted lavish spending within the top brass of BSA, including the salary of the Chief Scout Executive, who earns a total compensation of $1.2 million annually.

The next of the five remaining trials against the BSA and its Cascade Pacific Council in Portland is not yet scheduled, but Clark said that he expects it will happen in the Fall of this year.

 ###

 To arrange for interviews with attorneys Kelly Clark and/or Paul Mones, please contact
Rebecca Tweed, Media Relations Director at:
(503) 860-6033 or Rebecca@tweedandassociates.com

January 15, 2010
By John R. Ellement and Jonathan Saltzman, Globe staff

Defrocked Roman Catholic priest Paul Shanley today lost his appeal before the state’s high court, ensuring that a key figure in the priest abuse scandal that rocked the Boston Archdiocese will remain behind bars.

(Yoon S. Byun/Globe Staff/file)

The Supreme Judicial Court upheld Shanley’s convictions for two counts of rape and two counts of indecent assault and battery obtained by Middlesex prosecutors in 2005. The victim first made his accusations against Shanley in 2002, some 20 years after the abuse took place at St. Jean’s Church in Newton when the boy was between the ages of 6 and 11.

The SJC rejected defense attorney Robert F. Shaw Jr.’s contention that Shanley’s trial was flawed because the "junk science” of "repressed memory" was used by prosecutors to explain that long gap.

An Advent Reflection on Child Abuse.
December 15th, 2009
By Kelly Clark

I just returned from a trip to Australia, where I traveled to take a class as part of my studies for a Master’s Degree in Theology—a course I am taking as I consider my own vocational direction, and not because of the child abuse cases I regularly file against churches.  I was glad to get away “down under,” to jump into academia, to wander about in Melbourne in the warm sunshine and friendliness of the Aussies, glad, especially, to get away from child abuse for a few days.  Or so I hoped.

My first day there—the first Sunday of Advent, as it happened–I found myself unexpectedly in a beautiful Catholic chapel at Newman College on the campus of the University of Melbourne, listening to a stunning Advent choral concert.  I pondered the ironies: me, a lawyer who has sued the Catholic Church for nearly twenty years, but also a Christian man hungry for spiritual truth and beauty, sitting among these devout Catholic people, enjoying their hospitality.  Twice in my life I have almost joined the Catholic Church, once only about 8 years ago, well after I had begun to do this kind of work, and once as a young law student; neither time have I been able to make the leap from Canterbury to Rome—from Anglicanism to Catholicism—the last time because I simply could not get around what I have learned in the child abuse cases.  But as I sat at Newman College in Melbourne, listening to Palestrina, to Thomas Talis, to Bach and Handel, I was for a few precious moments free from the agonies of the child abuse cases, free from worry about my clients– about their addictions, their depressions, their suicides– free to bask in the beauty of the Christian celebration of Advent in a Catholic chapel.

But as I walked out and headed over to the chapel at Trinity College—the Anglican college at University of Melbourne—for another service, this one a celebration of the Eucharist for the First Sunday of Advent, I thought about the day in a few weeks when I would take the deposition of the Archbishop of Portland, asking him about the actions of Father H, one of his priests who has abused children.  I thought about the questions I would need to ask him, about the way the Archdiocese of Portland has treated child abuse survivors, both historically and in litigation over the last two and a half years since the Archdiocese emerged from bankruptcy. Any of you who have followed these blogs will recall my frustration at the broken promises—promises to treat abuse victims with understanding and Christian compassion, to expedite the legal process to find resolution and healing— promises all broken in a return to scorched earth tactics in litigation.  I wondered how the same great faith that produced the beauty that I had just witnessed at Newman College Chapel could also produce a church that would repeatedly violate the Spirit of its Lord in allowing children to be abused, and then in abusing them again when they seek justice.  I considered the words of Jesus in Matthew 25—“whatever you have done to the least of these my brothers and sisters, so you have done to me”—and in a rush of anger I found myself wanting to shout those words at the legal teams for the Catholic Church and demand that they also consider them.  I quieted, then, and  prayed for guidance, for humility, lest I become too self-righteous or judgmental—I who have also failed to live up to my calling so many times, hurting so many people along the way. 

I found myself wishing I could ask the Archbishop of Portland to come sit with me at Newman Chapel, and then again at Trinity Chapel, to take in the choral anthems and to break the holy bread together, and then to talk about these things, not as trial lawyer and deponent, but as two Christian men trying to solve a problem.  I found myself thinking we could probably settle this case—probably all of the cases– in twenty minutes, focusing more on the healing of my client and the treatment for this sick priest than on anything monetary, which is not what my 17 year-old client cares about anyway.  I wondered if it might not be just that easy.

But then I reminded myself what my friends so often tell me—that I am often highly naïve and too trusting, and that I should just stop hoping for things that can never happen.  Probably they are right, I thought.  But still, as I turned up the sidewalk towards the doors of Trinity College Chapel, I felt immensely sad.  Sad for abuse survivors, most of all, but also sad for a broken church, for broken promises and for broken people.  And so I sang the opening hymn at the Advent Eucharist—“O come, O come Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel”—with all the air in my lungs, with a broken voice, and with tears in my eyes.

by Timothy Lytton
December 7, 2009
Huffington Post

News Coverage of Cardinal Edward M. Egan’s cover up of clergy sexual abuse in the 1990s while he was the bishop of Bridgeport would be shocking if it weren’t so familiar. The list of high ranking Catholic Church officials who failed to report credible allegations of child sexual abuse by priests to law enforcement includes the most prominent prelates of this generation: Cardinal Joseph Bernadin in Chicago, Cardinal Bernard Law in Boston, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua in Philadelphia, and Cardinal Roger Mahony in Los Angeles.

The Egan case does, however, highlight one feature of this ongoing scandal that is frequently overlooked: the role that civil lawsuits have played in uncovering most of what we know about clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and in motivating Church officials to address the problem.

To begin with, plaintiffs’ have lawyers compelled Church officials to produce secret files concerning abuse allegations and to provide sworn testimony about their own failures to adequately address the problem. Media reports about Cardinal Egan’s failures in Bridgeport are based on more than 12,000 pages of memos, church records, and testimony from 23 lawsuits against the diocese. Indeed, most media coverage of the scandal–dating back to the early 1980s–has been based on these types of litigation documents.

Civil lawsuits have also shaped our understanding of the clergy sexual abuse scandal as an institutional failure on the part of Church leaders. Throughout the scandal, some within the Church have attempted to focus attention exclusively on the perpetrators, suggesting that clergy sexual abuse is merely a matter of "a few bad apples." Others have argued that the whole matter has been blown out of proportion by plaintiffs’ lawyers and their clients seeking to make money off of the scandal by filing lawsuits. One also frequently hears suggestions that news coverage of the scandal is motivated by anti-Catholic media bias. Indeed, Cardinal Egan’s successor, Archbishop Timothy Dolan leveled this very accusation against the New York Times this fall.

By contrast, civil lawsuits have focused attention on the failures of Church officials. Plaintiffs’ lawyers sue large institutional defendants because they are better able to pay large settlements and judgments, and so clergy sexual abuse lawsuits have emphasized the failure of diocesan officials–especially bishops–to protect children from known abusers.

Media coverage of the scandal has been heavily influenced by this framing of clergy sexual abuse as an institutional failure on the part of Church officials. Litigation and trials have traditionally provided the type of drama that makes them attractive to journalists seeking to draw in readers. In addition, documents filed in court and sworn testimony provide the kind of credible sources of information that journalists like to rely upon.

By framing clergy sexual abuse as a problem of institutional failure on the part of Church officials, civil lawsuits have also motivated dioceses around the country to institute new programs to prevent sexual abuse before it occurs and to report credible allegations of sexual abuse when it does happen. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops reports that over 90 percent of dioceses have instituted such programs and have trained over 7 million people in preventing, investigating, and reporting child sexual abuse.

It is inconceivable that so many U.S. bishops would have instituted such ambitious efforts to address clergy sexual abuse in the absence of the intense media coverage and public attention generated by civil lawsuits–not to mention the liability exposure.

It has been 25 years since the first civil lawsuits were filed against Catholic Church officials for clergy sexual abuse, and much progress has been made as a result of them. That leading prelates such as Cardinal Egan are still fighting so hard to hide the record of their misdeeds indicates that there is more work to be done and that civil lawsuits against Church officials may still have a role in uncovering the truth, highlighting the misdeeds of officials, and providing much needed pressure for reform.

The head of the Catholic Church in Ireland has told UTV he was ashamed and shocked by the revelations of a report into 30 years of child abuse in the Dublin Archdiocese.

"I’m deeply ashamed and shocked at the abuse revealed in today’s report and I want to apologise to those who suffered abuse and to their families", the Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady, said.

"I also want to apologise to the people of this country that the abuse was covered up and that the reputation of the church was sometimes placed above the safety and well-being of the children."

On Thursday night, the head of the Dublin Archdiocese, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, branded the revelations revolting, adding no words of apology would ever be sufficient for the horrifying abuse.

Archbishop Martin said he was offering his shame and sorrow to survivors and claimed the Archdiocese had failed to recognise the theft of childhood.

The senior cleric said the paedophile priests were devious in their attempts to excuse and deny sickening attacks.

"I would appeal to each of those people who are named in the commission as having acted in a way which put children in peril to assess their behaviour in past and behaviour today," he said.

Archbishop Martin said the numbers of victims were likely to be much higher than known.

He handed over more than 5,000 secret Church documents to the Commission in January last year, sparking a legal battle involving Cardinal Desmond Connell.

The Cardinal tried to block the publication claiming they were legally privileged or confidential.

The Archbishop declined to be drawn on whether Cardinal Connell should step aside.

"I’m pleased to see that over the last few days the judgment of Cardinal Connell is not as black and white, or almost in the black that it was over a period of time," he said.

"He’s a man who struggled with his own personal make-up and his own conscience and came out earlier than most bishops on the right side.

"Give people credit for the good things they do."

On Thursday night, Cardinal Connell asked for forgiveness from the abuse victims who suffered at the hands of paedophile priests under his control.

The senior cleric said he was distressed and bewildered that those in such a sacred position could be responsible for the heinous crimes.

The frail 83-year-old, who was among four Archbishops criticised for not handing over information to authorities on abusers, said the abuse of children was an unspeakable crime.

"Although I am all too aware that such apologies and expressions of regret can never be adequate as a response to so much hurt and violation, and, in any case, lose value through repetition, I apologise again now from my heart," he said in a statement.

"The abuse of children is an unspeakable crime," he continued.

Although critical of the Cardinal, the report gave him credit for instigating two secret canon law trials, despite strong opposition from one of the most powerful canonists in the Archdiocese, Monsignor Sheehy.

They led to two priests being defrocked.

In 1995 he also handed over files on 17 suspect priests to gardai, although it was later revealed he was aware of at least 28 at the time.

Survivors have demanded the Cardinal and other senior figures face a criminal investigation.

© UTV News

San Francisco Appeal

Three former Sunnyvale residents announced today they have sued the Mormon church, the Boy Scouts of America and their stepfather in San Francisco Superior Court for alleged childhood sexual abuse.

The three men, who are brothers now aged 39, 41 and 43, claim that William E. Knox, 65, a Mormon church and Boy Scouts leader, molested them repeatedly in Sunnyvale between 1977 and 1987.

A brother identified as John Doe 2, who now lives in Georgia, said, "I’m a victim and a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. It was devastating to me. I’ve been abused hundreds of times over several years."

The brother alleged, "During the abuse, I told the church leadership responsible to protect me and they did nothing to protect me."

Knox married the brothers’ mother in 1979 and remains married to her, but the brothers are now estranged from Knox and their mother, according to Kelly Clark, a lawyer for the men.

The lawsuit alleges that before the marriage, Knox used his position as a church elder and youth leader to begin abusing them when they were members of a church-chartered Boy Scouts troop for which he was assistant leader. The molestation began during individual sleepovers at Knox’s Sunnyvale apartment, according to the lawsuit.

After the marriage, the sexual assaults allegedly continued at the family’s Sunnyvale home, in Knox’s car on trips to church and Boy Scouts activities, and during Scouts camping trips, according to the lawsuit.

The alleged abuse included fondling, child masturbation and oral copulation, the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit was filed about two weeks ago, but under state law the identity of the defendants could not be revealed publicly until a Superior Court judge ruled last week that the plaintiffs had provided enough corroborating evidence to allow disclosure of the defendants.

Two of the brothers now live in Georgia and the third in Colorado. They announced the lawsuit at a news conference at the Civic Center Plaza near the Superior Court courthouse.

They said they filed their lawsuit now because they became aware of the psychological effects of the abuse after they learned last December that Knox and their mother had moved to the same Georgia town where two of them live.

They said that caused them to begin for the first time to connect the psychological and emotional problems they suffered as adults to the alleged childhood abuse.

John Doe 1 said, "When I saw him in a car as he drove by, I literally began shaking."

Allen Ruby, a San Jose lawyer representing the church, said, "Any allegation of childhood abuse is a serious matter," but said, "The church will defend itself."

Ruby said, "The law does not make a church responsible for the conduct of a stepfather toward his children."

Deron Smith, a spokesman for Boy Scouts of America, said, "We’ve not seen the lawsuit and there is not a whole lot we can say at this point."

The lawsuit contends that the Mormon church and the Boy Scouts are liable because Knox was acting as an agent of both. It says the boys told local church officials and the Boy Scouts of the alleged abuse in 1984 and informed a church counselor in 1985 but alleges that the molestation was never reported to law enforcement authorities.

The suit also alleges the church and Boy Scouts were aware that Knox had shown a propensity to abuse boys when he lived in San Diego before moving to Sunnyvale in the early 1970s.

The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount of financial compensation. Clark said the men filed a civil lawsuit because the statute of limitations for a criminal prosecution has passed.
The brothers said they are seeking to hold the institutions accountable and to prevent molestation of other children.

John Doe 2 said, "I stand here today for children who will lay their head on their pillows tonight, shedding tears, knowing they will wake up to face their abusers again and again. If I can save just one child from childhood sexual abuse, I will have succeeded."

The lawsuit alleges that John Doe 1 was sexually abused from 1977 to 1982, John Doe 2 from 1977 to 1986 and John Doe 3 from 1977 to 1987.

It says that a high school friend who was a fellow Mormon and Scout member told John Doe 2 in 1983 that he had allegedly been abused by Knox.

The brothers said that Knox and their mother operated a now-defunct day care center at their home in Sunnyvale, known as Little Angel Day Care and Creative Play, for about 15 years, including during years when brothers were allegedly abused.

Clark said the lawsuit was filed in San Francisco because state law allows lawsuits to be filed in any county in which the defendants due business.

By Aimee Green,
The Oregonian

October 26, 2009

A man who claims he was molested by a Boy Scouts’ camp ranger in the 1970s is suing the organization for $5.15 million.

The man, who is now in his late 40s, says he was in his early teens when the ranger of the former Camp Mallard in Oregon sexually abused him during visits on weekends and in the summer. The suit claims that Edward Elston  sometimes gave his victim — identified only by the initials S.M. — money to keep quiet or threatened to hurt him if he told.

Elston was not charged with a crime. The plaintiff’s attorney, Kelly Clark,  said he believes Elston is dead.

The suit was filed Friday in Multnomah County Circuit Court. It is one of 11 filed in Oregon against the Boy Scouts of America by Clark in the last few years, on behalf of clients who say they were molested as children. All the suits are still pending.

S.M.’s suit claims that the Boy Scouts organization knew at least by the 1960s that pedophiles were using their scouting positions to victimize children and that the problem was institution-wide. "Despite this knowledge, these defendants did not implement adequate child sex abuse policies" by the time S.M. joined the Scouts.

The man didn’t realize how deeply the abuse had affected him psychologically until 2008, after extensive therapy sessions, Clark said.  

The Cascade Pacific Council, which is also named as a defendant in the suit, couldn’t be reached for immediate comment.

– Aimee Green

In scouting, trust is important, and troops act as a family to address problems. How did that backfire in Burnsville?

By JOY POWELL
Minneapolis Star Tribune
October 24, 2009

By Kelly Clark
October 23rd, 2009

So I was in the middle of a mediation in Portland yesterday on a case of abuse of a boy by a Methodist Church minister, when I received a call from a Minneapolis reporter.   It seems that a local Scoutmaster was arrested on charges of abusing several of his Scouts. See story at  http://www.startribune.com/local/south/65205132.html?elr=KArksUUUoDEy3LGDiO7aiU.

The thing I don’t understand,” she said, “is why these kids don’t say anything to anyone?  What sort of power do these pedophiles have that causes otherwise intelligent children to keep silent about what is happening?”

It is one of the regular questions I get asked:  Why don’t they tell?

What I told her was along these lines. I have had clients tell me that the abuser threatened them: one young man told about how his physician, who was regularly abusing him during medical checkups, took a scapel and laid it alongside the 12 year-old boy’s scrotum and said: “if you ever tell anyone what is  going on in this room, I will slice you open just like this– do you understand me?”   Often it is like this, a direct threat. Sometimes it is indirect: Bad things will happen to me if you tell; or bad things will happen to you.  Something will happen to your family.

Many times, abusers play on the spiritual or religious beliefs of the child: this is between you, me and God. What you have told me, and what we have done, is all covered by the seal of the confessional, and if you ever tell anyone, you will commit a mortal sin.

Sometimes it is relatively subtle:  this is our little secret.  What we share is special, and so do not ruin it by telling anyone.

The most baffling of all was this:  a man in his 40’s told me why he, as a 16 and 17 year  old boy never told anyone about the fact that his priest, a highly popular figure in and around Portland, was regularly sodomizing him.  “You need to understand that Fr P was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I was nothing, then he came along and made me special.  I was his favorite, he paraded me around to other priests, to bishops, to business leaders, as such ‘a fine young Catholic boy’—I couldn’t imagine losing all that. In fact—and this is the most shameful thing of all—I gloried in it.”  Gently I told him, “You are not the first person, or the first child, ever to trade sex for love and attention. You are not the first and you won’t be the last. Don’t blame yourself.”

And that’s what I say now when anyone asks me why these kids don’t tell.  It is what I say to defense lawyers, judges and juries who want to know why they don’t tell. I explain it to newspaper reporters who have that question.  Some kids are threatened, directly or indirectly. And the most heinous threat of all, in my view, and the most effective, is that if you don’t do what I want you to do, then I will withdraw my love.

Back to Minnesota,   I have a sick feeling in my stomach that between the Scouts, the church, the bus route, you’re going to end up with dozens of victims, maybe more.

By Kelly Clark
October 22, 2009

I never get used to stories like this and it is never anything but devastating to me. Child abusers have social intelligence regarding kids that is off the charts. They know how and when to threaten, to charm, to bribe, to trick kids into believing that what we are doing is okay, that you shouldn’t tell anyone. The Scouts know this, because they have more experience with child abuse than anyone in the country, and have for about 50 years. But if– and I don’t know this yet– but if they didn’t share that knowledge with the parents and the kids, if they didn’t train the kids, train the parents, on the way these perps operate, then they have failed the kids and the parents. If a child molester sees even a slit of light, he will extort it in a minute. The Scouts know this, so there is really no excuse for a failure to train– if that is in fact what happened.

I have a sick feeling in my stomach that between the Scouts, the church activities, and the bus route that this man held, you’re going to end up with dozens of victims, maybe more.

Read more here:

//www.startribune.com/local/south/65205132.html?elr=KArksUUUoDEy3LGDiO7aiU

French ‘Minister of Culture’ Frederic Mitterrand Finds Childhood Sexual Abuse Still Not Acceptable—Even to ‘Sophisticated’ European Morals.

By Kelly Clark, Child Sexual Abuse Attorney
Portland, Ore.

American political junkies often use a phrase to describe a politician’s secure standing with the electorate: “He’s a shoe-in—that is, unless he gets caught sleeping with a dead woman or a live boy.”   In other words,  Senator Bulbousnose will surely win, unless, that is, he steps across the unspoken final lines of decency we all know about—necrophilia and pedophilia being two  of them.

So, there are two things that amaze me about the unfolding scandal in France: first, that the Minister of Culture, Frederic Mitterrand, would think that his lurid book accounts of “paying for boys” in Thailand could fly under the radar and not matter to his public career; and, second, that it almost did.

In case you haven’t read about this unbelievable story, here is a quote from the Times Online, dateline October 8:

“President Sarkozy’s new Culture Minister, Frédéric Mitterrand, was struggling to save his name and possibly his job last night amid a storm over his past accounts of paying “boys” for sex. The nephew of the late President Mitterrand, who is openly gay, was thrown on the defensive after opposition politicians homed in on a memoir in which he described his delight in visiting brothels in Bangkok.

“I got into the habit of paying for boys … The profusion of young, very attractive and immediately available boys put me in a state of desire that I no longer needed to restrain or hide,” he wrote. The autobiography, La mauvaise vie (The Bad Life), was a critically acclaimed bestseller in 2005 and Mr Mitterrand, 62, a popular television presenter, was praised for his honesty. It rebounded on him this week after he leapt to the defence of Roman Polanski, the filmmaker, who was arrested in Switzerland for extradition to face a Los Angeles court for having sex with a girl aged 13.”

Now, let’s ignore the obvious about-face he has done in the last day or so, trying to play down what he has written. After all denying the obvious is what politicians do– although trying to say that admitting that he paid for sex with boys doesn’t mean that he paid for sex with boys may set a new standard.

No, I want to ponder the two aspects of all this that I mentioned above.  First, how did someone who wrote this—in 2005—get  appointed to a high post in a European government?  Surely he did not think no one would notice: he is, after all, the highly visible nephew of former President Francios Mitterrand and a TV personality in his own right.  No, it seems he was doing what a lot of celebrities do, which is to write a lurid autobiography “revealing all” to boost sales through shock value.  Surely he intended the world to know that he was tantalized and hooked by the Asian sex trade. He wanted people to know…

No, what is amazing to me is that he thought that this admission would shock people in no different way than, say, talking about drunken nights on the town or lurid sexual escapades of the kind we have grown used to with celebrities.  But that  he thought he could just cruise on in as Minster for Culture—that’s so rich in irony I can’t even know where to start— after admitting to deep-seated pedophilic behaviour is just stupefying. I don’t know whether this says more about the man’s flawed political judgment,  or about how far Western standards for decency have fallen.  After all, let’s not forget, that this book was published 4 years ago and up til now there had been no blow up.   He actually thought he could get away with it.

This brings me to the second source of amazement—he almost did. In fact, had it not been for the controversy over Switzerland’s arrest and the US’s extradition demands of filmmaker Roman Polanski for sexually abusing a 13 year old girl, we old-fashioned types in the US might not ever have heard about Mitterrand’s pedophilia.  But the fact that Europe heard about it and there was no uproar for nearly five years surely says something fundamental about the way those ‘sophisticated’ societies think (the condemnation by the avant garde of the US in fashionable circles for Polanski’s arrest is no less indicative).  Is it really okay for a major public personality now become public minister to have engaged in pedophilia?  Note that there is no indication that he has acknowledged in sorrow the wrongness of his behavior, sought help, amended his way of life.  This is not a story about a guy who couldn’t find forgiveness when he asked for it. This is about a guy who didn’t—apparently didn’t—even realize that what he had done was fundamentally wrong… even by the standards of Senator Bulbousnose… even by standards of European ‘sophistication.’  

Boy—no pun intended—did Mitterand get the surprise of his life. There are still some things that politicians, even in Europe,  can’t do. Thank God.

The justices on Monday turned down a request by the Roman Catholic diocese in Bridgeport, Conn.

Foxnews.com
Monday, November 5th, 2009

The Supreme Court has refused to block the release of documents generated by lawsuits against priests in Connecticut for alleged sexual abuse.

The justices on Monday turned down a request by the Roman Catholic diocese in Bridgeport, Conn.

Several newspapers are seeking the release of more than 12,000 pages from 23 lawsuits against six priests.

The records have been under seal since the diocese settled the cases in 2001. Courts in Connecticut have ruled that the papers should be made public.

The high court also refused to make a decision Monday on whether to hear arguments from a group of Chinese men who have been imprisoned at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp for more than seven years.

The justices reviewed the case last week, but made no announcement about how they will move on the petition from the Uighurs — whose relocation has been part of a larger headache for the Obama administration, which is trying to meet its self-imposed pledge to close Gitmo by January.  The Uighurs were picked up in Afghanistan following the Sept. 11 attacks, but have steadfastly maintained they had no role in supporting the Taliban or Al Qaeda.  The Pacific island of Palau has agreed to take 12 of the remaining 13 Uighurs on a temporary basis.  Last year, a federal judge in Washington concluded the men had been detained long enough and ordered that they be released into the United States. On emergency appeal, another court blocked that decision and eventually overturned the ruling. 

FOX News’ Lee Ross and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

KTVZ.com

Assemblywoman Margaret M. Markey was rushed to an Albany hospital on June 23, the last day of the Assembly’s session, and was held overnight for observation with symptoms later diagnosed as dangerously high blood pressure.

The episode, aides said, whatever its cause, capped an intensely difficult period for Ms. Markey, 62, a Queens Democrat who had been cajoling and vote-herding for months in a frantic effort to shore up support for her Child Victims Act, a bill that would loosen restrictions on lawsuits involving the sexual abuse of children.

This was the year the perennial legislation appeared to have a chance. It had already passed in the Assembly by wide margins in 2006, 2007 and 2008. And though the State Senate had blocked the bill in the past, a new Democratic majority there appeared likely to make New York one of three states with a law allowing people to sue their alleged molesters — during a specific grace period — no matter how long ago the abuse took place.

But on that day, as the clock ran out on the 2009 session, Ms. Markey had come up short: Assembly leaders were unconvinced that she had the votes to win, and had yanked her bill from the calendar — ending its prospects in the near term and raising questions about its future viability.

Opponents have declared the bill dead. Ms. Markey has assured supporters it will pass in the fall, if the governor calls a special session of the State Legislature.

In any event, the bill’s collapse was a victory for the Roman Catholic Church, which led a shrewd and relentless campaign against the measure, and a blow to abuse victims and their lawyers, who have been pressing for Ms. Markey’s bill, and others like it around the country, since the revelations in 2002 about the molestation of children by priests in Boston.

And Ms. Markey’s brief medical emergency — she returned to work the following day — only seemed to underline the intensity of the struggles already fought and still ahead for a bill that plumbs two of the most profoundly complicated issues in human experience: sexual abuse and money.

The fight has been grueling on both sides. Bishop Nicholas A. DiMarzio of the Diocese of Brooklyn, the outspoken prelate who marshaled the church’s campaign against the legislation — calling it anti-Catholic, and warning lawmakers he would be forced to close churches and schools in their districts — was himself ordered by doctors to undergo hastily scheduled heart bypass surgery on June 16.

He and other Catholic bishops in New York said the Markey bill would impoverish the church, pointing to a 2002 law in California that prompted hundreds of lawsuits, forced the state’s dioceses to pay more than $1 billion in restitution and led the Diocese of San Diego to file for bankruptcy protection.

“Nothing I’ve been involved in during my years in politics has ever been as excruciatingly painful as the fight over this bill,” said Assemblyman Charles D. Lavine, a Long Island Democrat who is among two dozen lawmakers who supported the Markey bill in past years, but hesitated this year.

Mr. Lavine changed his mind after priests and residents in his predominantly Italian-American and Hispanic district, especially older voters, started swamping his office with phone calls last winter, expressing their opposition. The pressure, which went on for months, led him to consider — for the first time, he said — the “humongous financial burden and, frankly, the ridicule” that the Child Victims Act and resulting lawsuits would inflict on the church.

His yes votes in past sessions, he said, were made partly with the knowledge that the Republican majority leader in the Senate, Joseph L. Bruno, a staunch opponent, would never let the bill see daylight in that chamber. Mr. Bruno stepped down in 2008.

“When it was never going to fly anyway, there was a tendency for many of us who are concerned about victims’ rights to symbolically support legislation like this,” Mr. Lavine said.

In the same way, the Catholic hierarchy in New York never felt it had to mount a serious campaign against the bill as long as Mr. Bruno held the line, according to lobbyists and legislative aides. Their effort this year forced longtime backers of the bill, like Mr. Lavine, to weigh the potential consequences of that support against their empathy for abuse victims.

With 76 votes needed for a majority in the 150-member Assembly, Ms. Markey’s bill passed with close to 100 votes in past years. This year, the bill’s solid support ranged, depending on the day, between 70 and 80, Ms. Markey’s aides said.

Lobbyists and advocates on both sides say other factors contributed to the change in climate.

When the Democratic Party leadership in the Senate was toppled on June 8 by the defection of two members to the Republican ranks, wavering supporters lost an incentive to risk the church’s ire in the crucial final weeks of the Assembly session.

“If it’s going to be a one-house bill anyway, why make people take the heat?” said Assemblyman Peter J. Abbate Jr., a Brooklyn Democrat who was once a co-sponsor of Ms. Markey’s bill, but this year withdrew his support.

As originally proposed, Ms. Markey’s legislation had two main parts, one permanent and one temporary: It permanently extended the statute of limitations for filing civil suits over alleged child sexual abuse to 10 years — from the current 5 years — after a victim turns 18.

The temporary and more contentious proposal was to suspend the statute of limitations altogether for a year. Starting the day the law took effect, anyone claiming past abuse would have one year to file suit, regardless of how long ago the incident occurred. After a year, the statute of limitations would resume.

In trying to bolster her support, Ms. Markey added amendments. One gave the same rights to abuse victims who attended public schools as those from private or parochial schools, overriding the special protections public entities have under state law. One set an age limit of 53 on those who could file suits during the one-year window.

By most accounts, the amendments produced no new votes and fractured her support. Thomas K. Duane, the Senate sponsor of her bill, washed his hands of it, objecting to the age-limitation amendment. The amendment to include public schools drew fire from school and municipal officials.

Supporters of the bill, including BishopAccountability.org and Survivors for Justice, a Jewish group, have vowed to press on.

Ms. Markey’s spokesman, Mike Armstrong, said advocates are paying visits this summer to the offices of the two dozen lawmakers considered wobbly in their support, but still persuadable. “The leadership has told us they will put it on the agenda if she holds her votes with comfortable margins,” he said.

Bishop DiMarzio, whose diocese includes Queens, where Ms. Markey lives, has often mentioned her bill in sermons and his column in the diocesan newspaper.

“Retribution never brings about justice, nor will the crippling of the church’s ability to carry out its mission serve any purpose,” he wrote in his last column before entering the hospital in June. He has not addressed the issue since then. A diocesan spokesman said his quadruple bypass surgery was a success.

As it happened, the bishop was released from the hospital on June 23 — the day Ms. Markey’s bill was withdrawn.

Salem-News.com

Tim King
June 25th, 2009

After clearing the House, House Bill 2827 will go to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski to be signed into law.

(SALEM, Ore.) – A bill that would raise the age of sex abuse victims in Oregon from 24 to 40 will likely become law. The future of House Bill 2827 appeared bleak when we wrote about it May 28th 2009. (see: Will Oregon Stand for Sex Abuse Victims? – Tim King Salem-News.com

Many of the cases originate from churches in Oregon and experts like Portland Attorney Kelly Clark, say it often takes several decades for a person to comprehend the magnitude of their experience and come forward.

Bill Crane from the group SNAP, (Survivors Network of people Abused by Priests) says it is a good day in Oregon and while cautious, he agrees that it is good news on a day that could use it.

Molly Woon with the Oregon State Legislature says H.B. 2827 passed through the Senate Floor today, after moving through the Oregon House unanimously.

Woon says there was an amendment and the bill has to now go back to the House for concurrence. The change, "removed definition of causable connections between injury and child abuse," according to Woon.

She says it amounts to a technical fix.

After clearing the House, House Bill 2827 will go to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski to be signed into law.

www.OregonLive.com

by Paul Mones, guest opinion
Tuesday June 02, 2009, 8:30 AM

Our state legislators are in the midst of dealing with one of the worst fiscal crises in recent memory. No doubt they will have to make many tough, unpopular decisions this year. However there is one legislative decision they need not fret over because it is a no-brainer. House Bill 2827 is a simple piece of legislation that gives an extra measure of justice to victims of child abuse.

In the words of one of the bill’s co-sponsors Chris Garrett (D-Lake Oswego ) – the other sponsor is Rep. Andy Olson (R-Albany) – this bill "will ensure an effective civil remedy for victims of child abuse."

The bill extends the present statute of limitations by giving victims until the age of 40 to file an action against their abuser, requiring that claims be initiated by the time the victim turns 40 years old or within five years of when the injury or the connection between the abuse and the injury is discovered. The bill has unanimously passed the house but curiously has not received the same overwhelmingly positive reception in the Senate.

The extension of the statute of limitations makes common sense because it recognizes that most child victims of sexual abuse cannot confront their debilitating problems until they are mature adults. Moreover, most victims can’t even make the connection between the abuse and their psychological problems until they have some real distance from the time period of their abuse.

Child abuse is the perfect crime because its victims are too powerless, too confused to help themselves when they are actually being abused. These children travel quietly through their days interacting with teachers and passing police officers, friends and neighbors, never revealing the anguish of their existences. And if by chance someone asks them how they are being treated at home their responses will be uniformly the same: OK.

As adults we expect all human beings to escape or at least want to escape when someone injures them, but for victims of abuse, the reverse occurs. And that is in fact perhaps one of the most insidious aspects of child abuse: It binds the child closer to the abuser. The abuser’s threats and intimidation engender in the child not only fear but self-blame and embarrassment – all of which turns a child’s survival mechanisms topsy-turvy. Emotional attachment and sexual violence become so inextricably confused that even when the abuse is reported, the child will often kick and scream as they are being removed from their draconian environment by a social worker.

The other aspect that makes child abuse a perfect crime is that most adults continue to believe that child-rearing is a private matter. They don’t want a relative, friend or neighbor telling them how to raise their child so they won’t intervene in someone else’s family. While we all cherish our right to privacy, our devotion to this cornerstone of democracy is strangling the lives of thousands of children every year. Abusive parents and caretakers thrive on isolation and that is exactly what their relatives, friends and neighbors give them.

Daily, people turn a blind eye to the screams, bruises and frightened eyes of battered and molested children. Their reaction actively reinforces the offender’s omnipotence and tells the child you’re on your own, no one is going to help you. By powerful social training we are more likely to intervene on behalf of a dog being kicked by its owner than a child being mistreated by a parent. As Americans we routinely gawk at the suffering of car accident victims but we avert our eyes and ears when we see a child being backhanded in a supermarket.

It is often only when a child becomes a mature adult that he or she has the strength and emotional resources to confront the scourge of their past.

We have done much in Oregon over the past few years to protect victims of abuse, the most recent example being the passage of HB 2062, which will prevent schools from silently moving sexually abusive teachers one district to another. If the Senate saw fit just several weeks ago to join the House in ending the scandalous practice of allowing sexually abusive teachers from negotiating sweetheart deals with their school districts, then it surely should see the wisdom in HB 2062.

Paul Mones is an attorney and a children’s rights advocate.