Boy Scouts get conditional approval of $850M bankruptcy deal
Source: AP
Bankruptcy judge, Judge Laura Selber Silverstein, on Thursday approved a proposal by the Boy Scouts of America to enter into an agreement that includes an $850 million fund to compensate tens of thousands of men who say they were sexually abused as youngsters by Scout leaders and others.
Following three days of testimony and arguments, Judge Laura Selber Silverstein granted the BSA’s request to enter into an agreement involving the national Boy Scouts organization, roughly 250 local Boy Scout councils, and attorneys representing some 70,000 men who say they were sexually abused as youngsters decades ago while engaged in Boy Scout-related activities.
While ruling that BSA officials exercised proper business judgment as required under the law in entering into the agreement, the judge refused to grant a request that the Boy Scouts be allowed to pay millions in legal fees and expenses of attorneys hired by law firms that represent tens of thousands of abuse claimants.
The judge noted that coalition attorneys had emphasized last year that their legal fees would be paid by individual law firms they were representing, and that abuse claimants would not be responsible for those costs. Silverstein said any payment of legal fees by the Boys Scouts, or by the victims fund, which was also contemplated in the agreement, “comes directly or indirectly out of their clients’ pockets, and indeed the pockets of all abuse victims.”
“Any funds diverted from abuse victims, especially to pay an obligation of their lawyers, needs to be closely examined,” she said.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/business-5e9e219a10f44f80507cd7dc0df3fdb8
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