Suit accuses Scout leader of abusing boy in 1950s
The attorney for a Portland man who alleges he was molested by a Boy Scout leader nearly 50 years ago filed a $3.1 million lawsuit Wednesday against the Boy Scouts of America and one of the organization’s state affiliates, Cascade Pacific Council.
The Multnomah County case alleges that Donald L. Santy, 85, used his position as a Scout leader in Portland to molest a Boy Scout over about two years. The lawsuit does not identify the Boy Scout, who at the time was about 10 years old.
Reached at his home in Surprise, Ariz., shortly after the lawsuit was filed, Santy said he barely remembers the time more than 40 years ago when he lived in Portland. But he denied molesting the boy and said he never participated in the Boy Scouts while living in Oregon.
Santy said he was a Scout executive in the Chicago area in the 1950s and later became executive director of the Boys Clubs of Portland, now the Boys & Girls Clubs of Portland Metropolitan Area, which is not named in the lawsuit.
Santy was arrested in the 1960s while working in Portland for the Boys Clubs. He said he was convicted of contributing to the sexual delinquency of a minor but had been framed by a vindictive former employee. That conviction was unrelated to the alleged abuse of the Boy Scout in Portland, according to the former Scout’s attorney, Kelly Clark of O’Donnell & Clark.
Clark said Santy abused his client 40 to 50 times over two years at locations including Scout camps, official scouting events, a car and an apartment, Clark said.
Although the abuse occurred decades ago, Clark said, his client had not realized how it affected him until this year, when he gradually grew to accept what had happened while reading about abuse within the Catholic Church. Clark said it is common for a sex abuse victim to take decades to heal and said his client is still in the early stages.
Clark described his client as the son of an alcoholic father and said the boy turned to the Scouts for help and got to know Santy.
"Santy was my client’s surrogate father," Clark said. "He was everything to him. They went everywhere together."
Then their relationship turned sexual, Clark said.
Because of the abuse, the complaint said, the former Boy Scout "has suffered and continues to suffer severe and debilitating physical, mental, and emotional injury, including pain and suffering, physical and emotional trauma, and permanent psychological damage," the complaint says.
The case filed Wednesday is the second this year against the Boy Scouts involving an alleged child-abuse victim represented by Clark.
In January, two brothers filed a $6.5 million lawsuit against the Scouts and the Mormon church for alleged sexual abuse in the 1980s by former Scout leader Timur Van Dykes, also known as Timur Vandykes, who has been convicted of at least 23 sex crimes against boys.
The Dykes civil case is pending.
Internal Boy Scout records obtained by The Oregonian that show between 1970 and 1990 about 50 Scout leaders in Oregon and about 2,000 nationwide were kicked out of the Boy Scouts for child sex abuse or related crimes, such as child pornography. The Santy case is not among those files.
The Boy Scouts destroyed most of their pre-1970 files and won’t discuss them in detail or provide statistical information about child sex abuse within their ranks.
Cascade Pacific Council field director Don Cornell said he had just learned of the Santy lawsuit, didn’t have any information about Santy and wouldn’t comment on legal issues. The national council of the Boy Scouts did not return a phone call requesting comment.
Santy said that after getting out of jail in Oregon, he moved to Seattle, where he ran a company working with professional trade associations and fundraising for churches, synagogues and other nonprofits.
He said has not worked with children since leaving Portland more than 40 years ago.
Peter Zuckerman: 503-294-5919; peterzuckerman@ news.oregonian.com
