US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito has temporarily put on hold youth organisation Boy Scouts of America's bankruptcy plan on the request of former scouts challenging the $2.46 billion settlement to compensate sex abuse victims.
The brief order provides the top court more time to decide on the request by a group of 144 abuse claimants to block the settlement from moving forward. The request was made by them on February 9, Reuters reported.
The former scouts have claimed that the deal unlawfully bars them from pursuing lawsuits against organisations, which was not bankrupt. These include churches that ran scouting programs, local Boy Scouts councils as well as insurers, who provided coverage to the organisation.
Alito is handling a few requests involving cases from a group of states like Delaware, where this matter was earlier decided.
Over 82,000 men are involved in this settlement. They have claimed that they were abused during their childhood days by troop leaders while being a part of Boy Scouts.
The official committee that represented abuse claims in the bankruptcy was co-led by abuse survivor Doug Kennedy, who described the delay as a ‘horrible’ outcome. As many as 86% of abuse survivours have voted in favour of the Boy Scouts settlement in bankruptcy court, according to Kennedy, who noted that survivours have already waited decades for their abuse to be addressed.
“There was finally a light at the end of the tunnel, and now this has been yanked away from them,” the Reuters report quoted Kennedy as saying.
So far, the settlement trust has paid around $8 million to over 3,000 persons.
Retired bankruptcy judge Barbara Houser, who is the trustee in charge of administering the Boy Scouts settlement, noted that Justice Alito's latest order will put all work on the settlement on hold. This includes evaluating claims and mailing cheques to the abuse survivours.
On its behalf, the Boy Scouts of America stated that the order was just a short-term measure. Further, it hoped that the US Supreme Court would deny any further request for a longer pause that would "inflict severe harm on both the Scouting movement and Scouting-abuse survivors."
In 2020, the Boy Scouts filed for bankruptcy after a few US states enacted laws allowing accusers to sue over decades-old abuse allegations. Later on, the organisation reached a settlement, which was approved in a court in 2022.
(Edited by : Sudarsanan Mani)
