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.
The Oregonian series on sexual abuse in the public schools is as important a piece of journalism as the landmark 2002 Boston Globe series on the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church.
Those school districts, administrators, teachers and teacher union representatives -- who The Oregonian exposed as turning a blind eye to the pain, suffering and exploitation of children and teens -- are every bit deserved of the public’s wrath as the bishops and priests who condoned and conspired to cover up the sexual abuse of children by priests. The power exercised by the teachers union in protecting its own is what dioceses have historically done with respect to predatory priests.
The response of our schools to sexual abuse sounds eerily familiar: confidential settlements, clandestine financial deals and abusive teachers moving from district to district. The actions of the schools are perhaps more egregious because state law requires that parents send their children to school and imposes on schools the legal obligation to protect the health, safety and welfare of children delivered into their care. That’s why the law mandates that teachers and administrators report suspicions of child abuse to appropriate authorities. Tragically, our schools have placed the avoidance of scandal and the good name of a teacher over the protection of children.
Though individual teachers and principals who ignore the complaints and obvious signs of abuse are to blame for this sordid situation, real responsibility also lies with the state Teacher Standards and Practices Commission, which is operating under remarkably naive and myopic rules and regulations. The commission that hears the complaints of abuse should not be in the business of giving second chances to teachers who admit to sex-related offenses with children. Teachers who engage in any sexually predatory behavior with children should not have contact with children. It is a no-brainer. The research is clear: Except in the most rare and unusual circumstances, adults who are attracted to, or sexually aroused by minors, do not typically change their behavior.
The commission can’t even keep up with hearing the complaints. To give it the added responsibility of rehabilitating even so-called "good educators" is foolhardy. As attorneys who have spent our careers protecting children, we abhor the executive director’s cavalier pronouncement that the commission makes discipline decisions based upon "gut feelings."
The message from our public educational establishment is clear: When it comes to the matter of sexual abuse, the first priority is not the children but the teachers.
We heartily support The Oregonian’s recommendations for reforming this abysmal situation; however there are two efforts that can be undertaken right now. First, there must be stringent enforcement of the mandatory reporting laws, which require teachers and school officials to report suspicions of abuse. There is no doubt that fellow teachers, administrators and school districts that ignore such complaints or agree to silent deals to allow predatory teachers to go quietly away are endangering children. Those who do not report their suspicions of abuse to lawful civilian authorities should be prosecuted. The other method that has proven especially effective for the Catholic Church is civil litigation. If there is one thing cash-strapped school districts can ill-afford, it is paying money damages for grossly negligent and reckless behavior.
Kelly Clark is a Portland trial and appellate attorney who has represented plaintiffs in litigation against the Catholic Church, the Mormon Church, the Boy Scouts, public schools, and other "institutions of trust." He is a former Oregon legislator. Paul Mones is an attorney specializing in the children’s rights.
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.
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.”
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) A $25 million lawsuit against the Mormon church and the Boy Scouts alleges that child sex abuse has been widespread since the 1960s and little was done to prevent it.
Six men now in their 40s allege in their suit that the church and the Scouts "knew that assignments were being used by pedophiles to victimize children." Their attorney, Kelly Clark, calls it an "infestation of child abuse, stretching across the country, involving hundreds of predators and thousands of children." But an attorney for the Mormon church says only one individual was accused of abuse in the complaint the same man as in a previous lawsuit.
SALTLAKECITY - Several men have filed a $25 million lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, claiming that they were sexually abused by a Sunday school teacher more than 20-years ago – and the church did nothing about it.
The suit is brought by six men in the Portland, Ore. Area who say the incidents of abuse happened between 1980 and 1985 – when they were adolescents. The accused is Timur Dykes, 51, who at the time taught Sunday school at a Portland ward, was an LDS home teacher and local Boy Scout leader.
