Despite a $2.46 Billion Settlement, Many Boy Scout Abuse Victims Won’t See Justice
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Despite a $2.46 Billion Settlement, Many Boy Scout Abuse Victims Won’t See Justice
State laws severely limit how much of the landmark settlement survivors will actually receive
This week’s newsletter is a story about sexual assault, the Boy Scouts, and justice. It’s also about how the statute of limitations laws in childhood sexual assault cases hurt victims and help abusers hide. So, please read with care. While this is a hard story to read, it’s worth noting that so many of the men I’ve talked to over the years about abuse cases like this repeatedly mention how the #MeToo movement helped them understand their own pain and finally speak out. It’s a reminder of how powerful the truth is.
It’s all there, buried in the legalese and the mounds of paperwork. You almost need a translator to find it.
But Willam Vahl, 70, who was abused by his Boy Scout troop leader for three years — from the age of 12 to the age of 15 — will only be paid 30 percent of what he’s owed by the organization. If he gets anything at all.
Vahl’s abuse occurred in Iowa, a state where abuse victims have one to five years after they turn 18 to file a civil suit against the perpetrator. Vahl, along with 82,000 other former scouts, joined the class action lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America that alleged the BSA knew about the abuse and didn’t disclose it to families or law enforcement. Instead, the BSA kept a list of volunteers and leaders who were suspected of abuse. These lists were known as the “Ineligible Volunteer Files,” or “Perversion Files” or “Confidential Files.”
Vahl’s abuser, whom he’d met through the BSA, was on such a list, but Vahl didn’t know that until 2020. “I just know he hurt other people too,” Vahl says. He has a picture of him and two other boys taken in 1966; they’re nude and crouching in a river at night, holding onto one another, their eyes glowing from the flash of the camera, their mouths quietly open as if about to say something. Vahl says his abuser took the picture on a trip that he took the boys on. “I don’t know why he gave it to me,” Vahl noted, “or maybe I stole it.”
Vahl has documentation from the BSA stating that in 1970 his abuser admitted to “having homosexual relationships with boys” and was no longer allowed to volunteer with the organization. The man died in 1980, but for years Vahl has suffered the effects of extreme stress, including muscle pain and exhaustion. “It feels like waking up with the flu every day of my life,” Vahl told me.
Vahl graduated with honors from Iowa State University and tried to work as an engineer, but the stress and his pain made it nearly impossible to go into an office. By his 40s he was working only a couple of hours a day, living off his wife’s salary. He told no one about his abuse. Vahl had a troubled relationship with his own father; he had a lot to process. It took him decades to piece together his stress and pain with what happened to him in the Boy Scouts.
It wasn’t until he saw an ad about the class action lawsuit that he began to understand what had happened to him. He filed to join the lawsuit in November 2020. That year, faced with an overwhelming number of abuse claims, the BSA filed for bankruptcy.
In September of last year, a Delaware judge approved a bankruptcy settlement that would set up a $2.46 billion trust to pay out claims to abuse survivors. This deal made headlines. But the reality of the settlement means that survivors might not see any money or any justice.
“It’s like getting abused twice,” Zdunek said. Once by the man who hurt him, and again by the system that has failed him.
Buried in the piles of documents related to the settlement, housed on the website where survivors who are part of the lawsuit can find information on their claims, is a tiered structure that outlines payouts depending on the severity of the abuse and any mitigating factors, like the criminal and civil statutes of limitations for child sex abuse cases.
Paul Jan Zdunek was repeatedly raped by a BSA leader, but because the abuse happened in Marlyand, he might not see any money. Maryland only recently changed its statute of limitations on civil suits related to sex abuse cases. Zdunek expects legal challenges and says that his lawyers have explained it might be too little, too late for him.
Per the documents, victims in Alabama, Kansas, Oklahoma, Puerto Rico, Utah, South Dakota and Wyoming will only receive 1 to 10 percent of the settlement money owed to them from the $2.46 billion trust set up to compensate victims. Victims in Alaska, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, Rhode Island, Texas, the Virgin Islands, Virginia and Wisconsin will only see between 10 to 25 percent of the payouts owed to them.
In 2021, after years of introducing bills to eliminate the civil and criminal statute of limitations for victims of sexual abuse, Iowa State Sen. Janet Petersen won a small victory when Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a bill Petersen co-sponsored eliminating the criminal statute of limitations on child sex abuse.
But it wasn’t enough. Petersen’s been working tirelessly on this issue in Iowa. When she spoke to Vahl about how Iowa’s failure to eliminate the civil SOL had hurt his chance at justice, she was furious. She told me that a bill that would have eliminated the civil statute of limitations for child sex abuse cases was introduced to the legislature this year by Petersen, but it never made it out of committee. The legislature, which called a special session to pass a near-total abortion ban, couldn’t be bothered to pass a law allowing victims to find justice.
It’s not about the money, Petersen stressed. It’s about the lost years, the pain, the trauma — and for so many, a civil suit is the only way to get an abuser's name out into the public, create a record, and protect others.
“It’s like getting abused twice,” Zdunek said. Once by the man who hurt him, and again by the system that has failed him.
“It’s been a waste of a life,” Vahl told me. “I just want some sort of justice.”
Further Reading:
I wrote about statute of limitations laws in 2021. And today, Netflix released Scouts Honor, a documentary about the secret files.
Despite a $2.46 Billion Settlement, Many Boy Scout Abuse Victims Won’t See Justice
I feel like a damn hypocrite. Both my son and daughter LOVE Scouts BSA and we are heavily involved. As a former victim, no matter what activity my children are in, I am HYPER vigilant, so I knew what I was getting into when I signed them up. Like Catholicism, the core of BSA is beautiful and something I strongly support. But like Catholicism, those in charge take advantage for their own personal gain and it fucks the rest of us up. The shit from this is rolling downhill. The victims aren't getting their justice. Those currently in are paying for the sins of their predecessors. Literally. Our yearly dues almost doubled this year. We've been told the settlement has little to do with it, but that's bull. They filed bankruptcy to protect their huge amounts of landownership so they wouldn't have to sell them to pay the settlement. It's so fucked up and I'm just so mad that people take advantage of innocent children. The waves from abuse seem to never end. Ugh.
This turned into a giant rant and I'm sorry. I'm just so mad about all of this. Mad at the BSA. Mad at abusers. Mad at the system. It's all so fucked up.
They won't get rid of SOL laws because despite all the pearl clutching and talk about groomers, conservatives don't believe that rape exists, that all "victims" of any age or sex are liars, and if it was real they would have let everyone know right away, and just shut up and keep it swept under the rug! Prove me wrong.