Kentucky Boy Scout Leaders Failed to Report Allegations of Sexual Abuse to Police, Reports Sho

By Andrew Wolfson
The Courier-Journal
October 20, 2012

www.courier-journal.com/article/20121020/NEWS01/310210021/Kentucky-Boy-Scout-leaders-failed-report-allegations-sexual-abuse-police-reports-show

[national database - Attorney Kelly Clark]

[with video]

When a 47-year-old Louisville Boy Scout leader attempted in 1967 to molest a boy in a tent during an outing, scouting officials promised that they would keep the matter strictly confidential and say only that the leader resigned.

"The Scout office will make no general announcement," Scouting Executive Hal Cory wrote on Nov. 6, 1967, to Boy Scouts of America headquarters, which promised to put the report in its "confidential file."

The report is among a dozen outlining accusations of abuse against Kentucky Scout leaders in the 1960s and 1970s released last week as part of a cache of 15,000 pages of documents detailing allegations against 1,247 scout leaders nationwide.

The reports show that Kentucky Scout executives reported abuse to the Boy Scouts of America headquarters but not to police or prosecutors.

In one particularly egregious case, a popular Scout leader, after being accused of molesting seven boys in Lexington, was given 90 days to leave town instead of being turned in to authorities, the files show.

"Every effort is being made to keep this quiet," Lexington Scouting Executive Donald King wrote on Jan. 7, 1963, to the national council, adding that parents were prepared to prosecute if the Scout leader didn't meet their deadline for moving.

Cal Pfeiffer, a founding member of the local chapter of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said the disclosures show how pervasive sexual abuse of children is in society "in one group after another after another."

He said the Boy Scouts at least forced accused leaders to resign rather than moving them from parish to parish, as the church often did. But like the church, the Scouts didn't refer leaders for prosecution, he said, potentially allowing them to continue to prey on children in other capacities.

In addition to the Lexington report, there are six from Louisville, two in Ashland, and one each in Madisonville, Newport and Bellevue. They describe allegations dating to 1961.

The Courier-Journal could find no evidence in limited court records that the abuse alleged in the Louisville reports was brought to the attention of police. The newspaper isn't naming the former Scout leaders, even though they are identified in the Kentucky reports, because it could find no evidence that they had been charged with crimes.

There are 33 reports for Indiana, but none in Clark, Floyd or Harrison counties in Southern Indiana.

The Los Angeles Times, which has compiled a list of 5,000 Scout leaders expelled for alleged sexual misconduct between 1947 and 2005, lists 30 cases from Kentucky and 111 from Indiana.

In an interview, retired Louisville Scouting Executive Halsey Cory, who is 91 and lives in Florida, said the standard procedure was to "bring parents up to speed" and let them decide whether to contact police.

"If we brought every one of those things to court, we would have had to have a special group of lawyers," Cory said. "We thought we were doing the right thing by removing leaders from any contact with kids and notifying their parents."

Scouts acknowledge failures occurred

The records — formally called the Ineligible Volunteer Files but commonly known among Boy Scout officials as "the perversion files" — were obtained in a lawsuit brought by Kerry Lewis of Oregon, who alleged Scout leaders failed to protect him and other boys from known molesters.

In 2010, he won a jury verdict of nearly $20 million.

Officials with the Boy Scouts fought in the courts for years to prevent the release of the records, contending that fear of breached confidentiality could inhibit victims from reporting other abuse. But the Oregon Supreme Court ordered that they be made public.

In a statement, Wayne Perry, president of the Boy Scouts of America, acknowledged that there have been "instances where people misused their positions in scouting to abuse children, and in certain cases, our response to these incidents and our efforts to protect youth were plainly insufficient, inappropriate or wrong."

He added, "Where those involved in scouting failed to protect, or worse, inflicted harm on children, we extend our deepest and sincere apologies to victims and their families."

The Boy Scouts of America also said in a statement that the confidential files were never secret — that the organization cross-checked millions of volunteer applicants against the names in the files.

BSA now says it is a leader among youth organizations in preventing child abuse, with a comprehensive program of mandatory background checks, training programs and rules that prohibit leaders from one-on-one contacts with Scouts, including sleeping or showering with them.

All Scouting employees and volunteers are required to tell local authorities of any suspicion or belief that a child has been sexually or physically abused.

Barry Oxley, CEO for the Lincoln Heritage Council, which includes troops in 64 counties in Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana and Tennessee, said he thinks parents "clearly understand the multiple layers of protection" that now are in place.

Hidden abuse

The reports detail some horrific allegations of abuse.

In a 1962 report from Newport, a former Scout alleged that a man who became his Scout leader brought him from England to the United States in 1947 and forced him to engage in sexual acts for five years, threatening that he would never see his mother again if he didn't go along.

The report was placed in BSA's confidential file, but there is no record that it was passed on to police or prosecutors.

In one case, the mother of two boys in Troop 364 at Audubon Baptist Church reported in July 1978 that a Scout leader there had taken off her son's pants and molested him.

An official who reported the allegations to the Old Kentucky Home Council said the leader , generally admitted the accusations, resigned from the troop and agreed to consider seeking "professional assistance."

When the ex-leader failed to report back on his decision, the official said he was "currently undecided on whether I should pursue the matter with police authorities."

But in the letter to Cory, the official said that by putting the leader's name in Boy Scouts of America's "permanent file," it would guarantee he'd never again be involved in scouting. The official closed by saying, "I further request this letter be held in the strictest confidence."

In another Louisville case, from 1965, a Scout leader at the Crescent Hill Baptist Church troop was forced to resign and a report placed in the confidential file after he allegedly took three Scouts to his house and "displayed himself to them without any clothes on," then made advances toward one of them.

Cory told Boy Scout headquarters that the leader "had been the subject of conjecture concerning his attitude towards boys for some time. However, no charges have been placed, and none are contemplated at this time."

A few of the Kentucky reports were issued after Scout leaders were convicted of unrelated crimes.

A report from August 1973 about a Scout leader and Louisville native who was convicted of contributing to the delinquency of a minor in Munster, Ind., included a letter from him in which he said that after "careful consideration of my personal problem," he had decided to leave the Boy Scouts to "re-enter the priesthood."

The man is not listed as a priest in the Louisville area Catholic directory or in the Official Catholic Directory, which lists all priests nationwide.