Sexual-abuse victims of the Boy Scouts of America have a new option to potentially receive more compensation. But to initiate the process, they must pay as much as $20,000 to the youth group’s settlement trust, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The option was part of a deal the bankrupt Boy Scouts reached Thursday with one of its harshest critics, the official committee representing more than 82,000 abuse victims. The youth group, which apologized for past failures to protect children from pedophiles, hopes the new agreement can bring it closer to ending a bankruptcy that began two years ago. The organization faces a trial scheduled for March on its bankruptcy-exit plan, which includes roughly $2.7 billion for abuse victims. How much victims stand to get is disputed. Victims of the worst abuses are eligible to receive as much as $2.7 million each, though many plaintiffs’ lawyers believe that most will get a fraction of that amount. Under the new option, victims who believe that their abuse cases were particularly severe and that they should be entitled to additional compensation can ask for an independent review of their claims. The review will be conducted by an outside party picked from a panel of retired judges with tort experience. To trigger the review, victims would need to pay the Boy Scouts trust an initial $10,000 administrative fee, followed by an additional $10,000 immediately before the review begins. The Justice Department’s bankruptcy watchdog and an abuse victim criticized the fees during a virtual Boy Scouts hearing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., on Friday, saying they place an unreasonable burden on claimants.
