BOISE — A man has filed a $5 million lawsuit against the Boy Scouts and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, contending they didn’t do enough to stop a Scout troop leader from sexually abusing children.
Scout and church officials said the organizations take such allegations seriously and will investigate the claims even though they happened decades ago. But an LDS church spokesman criticized the plaintiff’s attorney for going to the media before taking the claims to church.
The plaintiff in the suit, only identified as “Tom Doe” in the legal documents, is a 53-year-old man who was born and raised in Nampa, according to his attorney, famed sex abuse claims attorney Kelly Clark.
The lawsuit was filed Thursday morning in Malheur County Circuit Court in Vale, Ore., which is where Clark said the majority of the abuse took place. The plaintiff alleges that Larren Arnold, a leader of his Nampa Boy Scout troop, sexually abused him for about three years, when the victim was between the ages of 10 and 13, and that the abuse left him with debilitating physical, emotional and mental injuries.
“My client worshipped Arnold; (he) thought the sun rose and set on him,” Clark said. Due to the sexual abuse his client received, Clark said his client has suffered a loss of respect for authority figures, of trust in others, and of his spiritual faith.
“He was a very devout person. He grew up in a devout family and had a testimony,” Clark said. “What is loss of faith worth? I know what it’s worth to me, and you can’t put a price on it.”
Scouts, church react
Arnold could not be immediately reached for comment. A recorded message for a Pocatello listing under Arnold’s name said the number had been temporarily disconnected at the customer’s request.
David Kemper, the Scout executive for the Ore-Idaho Council, said he had not yet seen the lawsuit and so couldn’t give specific comments. However, Kemper said, the Boy Scouts take any allegation of child abuse seriously.
“No matter when it is made, the issue of child abuse is serious and the organization is committed to making sure children involved in the program are able to do so in a safe environment,” Kemper said. “The Boy Scouts’ child abuse program is extensive. We have training for our adults in youth protection, and we’ve taught our youth the three Rs — recognize, resist and report.”
J. Craig Rowe, spokesman for the LDS church in Idaho, said the church also takes the allegations seriously.
“The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a zero-tolerance policy for child abuse and does all it can to help victims and report abuse. It will seriously investigate these decades-old allegations,” Rowe said in a prepared statement.
Recounting allegations
While Arnold was never convicted of a criminal act against his client, Clark said Arnold was convicted of sexual abuse of a minor under 16 in 1985, “a good 15 years after what happened to my client.” Arnold received a sentence of three years in prison for that offense, Clark said.
Arnold was listed as a registered sex offender in Bannock County several years ago for that unrelated offense but is no longer on any Idaho sex offender registry, according to public records.
Bannock County probation officials would not release any details of the case or Arnold’s current sex offender status.
Lawsuit names
organizations
The accuser alleges that the Nampa ward of the LDS church “called” Arnold to serve as a Scout troop leader to educate and minister to LDS families and their children. The troop was jointly operated by the Boy Scouts and the LDS church,
he said.
The accuser maintains that leaders of the Boy Scouts Ore-Ida Council, the national Boy Scouts of America organization and the church knew they had “institution-wide child abuse problems.”
At least one church official, who served as the troop’s assistant scoutmaster, knew the abuse was occurring, Clark alleged.
“My client knows for sure that one of the assistant scoutmasters witnessed the abuse,” Clark said.
“He was in the same tent. So he should have reported it and it should have stopped right then. We know, unfortunately, that this guy was allowed to go on and abuse kids for several more years.”
The plaintiff reported he was abused during scouting trips and outings in eastern Oregon and in Nampa, Clark said.
Despite the abuse claim and lack of criminal conviction against his client, Arnold is not included in the lawsuit.
“My client holds the organizations responsible,” Clark said. “Mr. Arnold has paid his penalties and his dues.”
Clark added: “We will prove that for at least five or six years after that, he was still on the Boy Scout rolls, and we think still serving.”
The attorney said he hopes that through this lawsuit, and through several other he has filed in the past, that the organizations will be stronger and safer, preventing abuse of other innocents.
“It’s not my view to shut them down. I believe it helps change good institutions and make them better. That’s my hope.”
BOISE - A man has filed a $5 million lawsuit against the Boy Scouts and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, contending they didn’t do enough to stop a Scout troop leader from sexually abusing children.
The lawsuit was filed Thursday in Malheur County Circuit Court in Vale, Ore., by a 53-year-old man identified only as Tom Doe.
Doe alleges that Larren Arnold, a leader of his Nampa, Idaho, Boy Scout troop, sexually abused him for about three years, starting in 1967, and that the abuse left him with debilitating physical, emotional and mental injuries.
Arnold could not be immediately reached for comment. A recorded message for a Pocatello listing under Arnold’s name said the number had been temporarily disconnected at the customer’s request.
Arnold was listed as a registered sex offender in Bannock County several years ago for an unrelated offense but is no longer on any Idaho sex offender registry, according to public records. Bannock County probation officials would not release any details of the case or Arnold’s current sex offender status.
Doe, who grew up in Nampa but now lives in the Portland, Ore., region, alleges that the Nampa ward of the LDS Church "called" Arnold to serve as a Scout troop leader to educate and minister to LDS families and their children. The troop was jointly operated by the Boy Scouts and the LDS Church, Doe said.
Doe maintains that leaders of the Boy Scouts Ore-Ida Council, the national Boy Scouts of America organization and the church knew they had "institution-wide child abuse problems."
David Kemper, the scout executive for the Ore-Idaho Council, said he had not yet seen the lawsuit and so couldn’t give specific comments. However, Kemper said, the Boy Scouts take any allegation of child abuse seriously.
"No matter when it is made, the issue of child abuse is serious and the organization is committed to making sure children involved in the program are able to do so in a safe environment," Kemper said. "The Boy Scout’s child abuse program is extensive. We have training for our adults in youth protection, and we’ve taught our youth the three Rs - recognize, resist and report."
At least one church official, who served as the troop’s assistant scoutmaster, knew the abuse was occurring, said Doe’s attorney, Kelly Clark.
"My client knows for sure that one of the assistant scoutmasters witnessed the abuse," Clark said. "He was in the same tent. So he should have reported it and it should have stopped right then. We know, unfortunately, that this guy was allowed to go on and abuse kids for several more years."
Doe was abused during scouting trips and outings in eastern Oregon and in Nampa, Clark said.
Arnold was convicted of sexual abuse of a child under 16 in Bannock County in 1985, Clark said.
"We will prove that for at least five or six years after that he was still on the Boy Scout rolls, and we think still serving."
J. Craig Rowe, spokesman for the LDS Church in Idaho, said the church takes the allegations seriously. He criticized Clark’s approach to the case.
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a zero tolerance policy for child abuse and does all it can to help victims and report abuse. It will seriously investigate these decades’ old allegations," Rowe said in a prepared statement.
"However, the way in which this case was filed raises a serious issue of which both the court and the public should be aware. The plaintiff’s attorney contacted media before the lawsuit was even filed knowing the church could not respond, in an attempt to create headlines rather than discover the facts. This approach trivializes the seriousness of child abuse and its tragic consequences."
Clark said he has brought dozens of similar cases against the Roman Catholic church and is currently litigating seven cases against the LDS Church.
"Based on my experience I would expect to find a long, ugly, broken trail of child abuse," he said. "I’m conscious of where we are and I would say that these both are rightly respected institutions, but the fact is in the 1960s and 1970s they were not doing their job."
TREASURE VALLEY - A former Nampa boy scout is claiming he was sexually abused by a leader in the 1960’s. He says the Boy Scouts and Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints failed to protect him from a predator.
Now, 40 years later, he’s suing both organizations for $5 million.
The former scout’s attorney was in Boise Thursday to talk about the lawsuit.
“He trusted his youth leader, his priesthood leader, who was also a boy scout leader. And that person badly betrayed his trust,” said Kelly Clark, of the Portland lawfirm O’Donnell and Clark, Attorneys at Law.
‘That person’ was allegedly Larren Arnold. The lawsuit alleges Arnold was the victim’s scout leader in the Nampa Second Ward in the late 1960’s. It’s not the first time he’s been accused of abuse. In 1985, Arnold pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of child sex abuse in Bannock County. But the lawsuit isn’t going after Arnold.
“If you put the fox in the chicken coop, you can’t blame the fox for doing what foxes do. You blame is the farmer. In this case, the farmer is the Boy Scouts and the Church,” Clark said.
The Ore-Ida Council of the Boy Scouts of America issued a written statement from scout executive David Kemper. It reads:
"Although we have heard of the litigation being brought against the Boy Scouts and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we have not received the complaint… However the safety of children is the highest priority of the Boy Scouts of America."
J Craig Rowe, Idaho area public affairs director for the LDS Church, issued this statement:
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a zero tolerance policy for child abuse and does all it can to help victims and report abuse. It will seriously investigate these decades’ old allegations."
Clark said both organizations are responsible for the abuse. When asked if it’s fair to make an organization police its members, he said, “Are we asking that the Church and the Scouts be responsible for failing to police everything, or are we asking that they be liable because they didn’t do the very obvious thing of reporting it once they knew it was going on? We think it’s the latter situation.”
BOISE -- A man has filed a $5 million lawsuit against the Boy Scouts and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, contending they didn’t do enough to stop a Scout troop leader from sexually abusing children.
The lawsuit was filed Thursday in Malheur County Circuit Court in Vale, Ore., by a 53-year-old man identified only as Tom Doe.
Doe alleges that Larren Arnold, a leader of his Nampa, Idaho, Boy Scout troop, sexually abused him for about three years, starting in 1967, and that the abuse left him with debilitating physical, emotional and mental injuries.
Arnold could not be immediately reached by The Associated Press for comment. A recorded message for a Pocatello listing under Arnold’s name said the number had been temporarily disconnected at the customer’s request.
Arnold was listed as a registered sex offender in Bannock County several years ago for an unrelated offense but is no longer on any Idaho sex offender registry, according to public records. Bannock County probation officials would not release any details of the case or Arnold’s current sex offender status.
Doe, who grew up in Nampa but now lives in the Portland, Ore., region, alleges that the Nampa ward of the LDS church "called" Arnold to serve as a Scout troop leader to educate and minister to LDS families and their children. The troop was jointly operated by the Boy Scouts and the LDS church, Doe said.
Doe maintains that leaders of the Boy Scouts Ore-Ida Council, the national Boy Scouts of America organization and the church knew they had "institution-wide child abuse problems."
David Kemper, the scout executive for the Ore-Idaho Council, said he had not yet seen the lawsuit and so couldn’t give specific comments. However, Kemper said, the Boy Scouts take any allegation of child abuse seriously.
"No matter when it is made, the issue of child abuse is serious and the organization is committed to making sure children involved in the program are able to do so in a safe environment," Kemper said. "The Boy Scout’s child abuse program is extensive. We have training for our adults in youth protection, and we’ve taught our youth the three R - recognize, resist and report."
At least one church official, who served as the troop’s assistant scoutmaster, knew the abuse was occurring, said Doe’s attorney, Kelly Clark.
"My client knows for sure that one of the assistant scout masters witnessed the abuse," Clark said. "He was in the same tent. So he should have reported it and it should have stopped right then. We know, unfortunately, that this guy was allowed to go on and abuse kids for several more years."
Doe was abused during scouting trips and outings in eastern Oregon and in Nampa, Clark said.
Arnold was convicted of sexual abuse of a child under 16 in Bannock County in 1985, Clark said.
"We will prove that for at least five or six years after that he was still on the Boy Scout rolls, and we think still serving."
J. Craig Rowe, spokesman for the Mormon church in Idaho, said the church takes the allegations seriously. He criticized Clark’s approach to the case.
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a zero tolerance policy for child abuse and does all it can to help victims and report abuse. It will seriously investigate these decades’ old allegations," Rowe said in a prepared statement.
"However, the way in which this case was filed raises a serious issue of which both the court and the public should be aware. The plaintiff’s attorney contacted media before the lawsuit was even filed knowing the church could not respond, in an attempt to create headlines rather than discover the facts. This approach trivializes the seriousness of child abuse and its tragic consequences."
Clark said he has brought dozens of similar cases against the Roman Catholic church and is currently litigating seven cases against the LDS church.
"Based on my experience I would expect to find a long, ugly, broken trail of child abuse," he said. "I’m conscious of where we are and I would say that these both are rightly respected institutions, but the fact is in the 1960s and 1970s they were not doing their job."
BOISE, Idaho (AP) - A man has filed a $5 million lawsuit against the Boy Scouts and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, claiming the two entities didn’t do enough to stop the sexual abuse of children by troop leaders.
The lawsuit was filed in Oregon State Court in eastern Oregon’s Malheur County on Thursday by a man identified only as Tom Doe.
Doe alleges that the leader of his Nampa, Idaho Boy Scout troop sexually abused him for about three years, starting in 1967, and that the abuse left him with debilitating physical, emotional and mental injuries.
NAMPA - A new childhood sexual abuse lawsuit will be filed Thursday against a Nampa area Boy Scout troop and LDS ward, Portland attorney Kelly Clark said.
Clark, who frequently handles such cases around the country, said the case will be filed in Circuit Court in Malheur County, Oregon, where some of the abuse occurred, although the Boy Scout troop, No. 101 and the LDS ward, Nampa Second Ward, were based in Nampa.
Dave Kemper, a representative of Boy Scouts of America Ore-Ida, said he was unaware of any lawsuit.
"Anytime there is an allegation it’s taken very seriously," Kemper said. "Since we’re not aware of any of it, it would be pre-mature to comment. And we will take the appropriate action based on the circumstances in regard to the allegation."
Clark will be in the Boise area on Thursday and will provide more details, he said.
Courts - A suit claims the group was aware of sexual abuse but let two leaders stay around boys
Friday, February 01, 2008
PETER ZUCKERMAN
The Oregonian Staff
A Portland man sued the Boy Scouts of America and its local Cascade Pacific Council for more than $3 million Thursday, alleging sexual abuse by two troop leaders in the mid-1970s.
The case brings to at least six the number of people in Portland alleging sexual abuse and suing the Boy Scouts. Together, the suits seek more than $28 million in damages.
The case filed Thursday in Multnomah County Circuit Court alleges that the Boy Scouts allowed two Scoutmasters, identified as Steven Terry Hill and Thomas Hensley, to stay in contact with boys after they knew of sexual abuse.
"We also intend to prove that the Boy Scouts were well aware, by at least the 1960s, that they had a serious, institution-wide infestation of child abuse, stretching across the country, involving hundreds of predators and thousands of children," said a statement from Portland attorney Kelly Clark, who is spearheading the sexual abuse suits.
Hill, 58, is one of about 50 Oregon leaders expelled by the Boy Scouts for sexual abuse between 1970 and 1990 and more than 5,100 leaders expelled nationally since 1946, according to confidential Boy Scouts files and summaries obtained by The Oregonian.
Hill registered as Scoutmaster of Troop No. 76 in 1975 and molested three boys in the troop, according to the internal Scouts records. He was convicted of child sexual abuse in the 1990s.
Hensley does not appear to have a criminal record and does not appear in the Scouts’ internal records. The Oregonian could not reach Hensley for comment; court documents do not provide his age, middle name or place of residence, or say whether he is still alive.
Officials with the Cascade Pacific Council of the Boy Scouts of America declined to comment, noting that they had not been served by the court.
Clark said his client, an unidentified man now in his mid-40s, met Hill and Hensley at Gregory Heights Middle School in Northeast Portland at a recruiting meeting for "high adventure" Scouting with Troop 76. The lawsuit alleges that the Scoutmasters fondled and sexually abused the boy at least twice a week for two years starting in 1976.
Hill resigned in 1978, according to Scouts records.
In 1991, Hill was convicted of four counts of sodomy, five counts of delivering controlled substances to a minor and three counts of furnishing alcohol to a minor. He remains in prison.
The prosecutor in the case said Hill had an "almost amazing ability to manipulate teenage boys," using his work as a photographer, his purported training as a juvenile lawyer and his role as president of "The High Adventure Club."
The lawsuit claims both organizations knew the danger of having Timur Dykes, 51, as a scout leader and did not take steps to protect the boys. Dykes is a convicted child sex offender
PORTLAND — A $25 million sex abuse lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Boy Scouts of America filed Wednesday alleges that child abuse has been widespread since the 1960s and little was done to prevent it.
The new lawsuit also claims the church and the Scouts “knew that assignments were being used by pedophiles to victimize children … “
Kelly Clark, the attorney who filed the complaint on behalf of six men now in their 40s, called it an “infestation of child abuse, stretching across the country, involving hundreds of predators and thousands of children.”
