The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to the Boy Scouts of America’s $2.46 bn settlement of sex abuse claims, shutting down an effort by a group of survivors to pursue lawsuits against churches and other organisations that operated scouting programs where abuse occurred.
The justices rejected an appeal filed by 75 abuse survivors seeking to overturn lower court rulings that upheld the bankruptcy deal, which bars claims against non-bankrupt organisations that contributed funds to the settlement.
The Boy Scouts organisation, now operating as Scouting America, said the decision removes the final legal obstacle hanging over the restructuring and allows the group to focus on compensating survivors and rebuilding its programs.
Scouting America CEO Roger Krone said the organisation can now move forward without the constraints imposed by prolonged bankruptcy proceedings.
He said investment decisions remain limited while a company stays in bankruptcy, with nearly all resources directed toward exiting court supervision.
Roughly $300 mn has already been paid to survivors under the settlement, according to Krone. With the appeals exhausted, claims evaluation and additional payments are set to resume. The settlement trustee, Barbara Houser, is pursuing further recovery through litigation against insurers and asset sales, including artwork by Norman Rockwell and Joseph Csatari owned by the organisation.
For the survivors who are worried about there being adequate funds, there are significantly more funds that will be available to the trustee than the $2.46 bn that she has today
Scouting America CEO Roger Krone
Outside of bankruptcy, Scouting America has also moved to update its programs and safety standards. Krone said recent changes include revised training aimed at preventing online predation and the introduction of modern reporting tools, including an anonymous text hotline for abuse allegations.
An attorney representing the 75 petitioning survivors did not respond to a request for comment.
The settlement, approved in 2022 by a bankruptcy court in Delaware, granted immunity from civil lawsuits to organisations that financially contributed to the deal, even if they did not file for bankruptcy themselves.
In a later, unrelated case, the Supreme Court ruled that bankruptcy courts lack authority to shield non-debtors from lawsuits, though that decision did not apply retroactively to completed cases such as the Boy Scouts restructuring.
After a federal judge rejected the survivors’ challenge, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the ruling.
Scouting America, along with insurers and survivor groups backing the settlement, urged the Supreme Court to stay out of the dispute, warning that reopening the deal would trigger severe financial strain and emotional harm for survivors relying on compensation.
Other survivor groups took the opposite view. A group claiming to represent about 1,000 former Boy Scouts had asked the court to intervene, arguing survivors should be allowed to pursue claims directly against sponsoring organisations.
The Boy Scouts sought bankruptcy protection in 2020 after multiple states expanded statutes of limitations for child sexual abuse claims, opening the door to lawsuits tied to decades-old allegations and triggering a surge of litigation nationwide.
