Why Payouts Are All Over the Map for Boy Scout Sexual Abuse Victims
Settlement fund could pay hundreds—or hundreds of thousands—for the same abuse
As a Boy Scout victim from Alabama, Gill Gayle is likely to get around $15,000 from a settlement fund compensating child sexual abuse victims, according to estimates.
But if he had been abused in New York, he would be eligible for more than 10 times that amount.
Gayle is one of more than 82,000 men who have submitted claims to a multibillion-dollar settlement fund set up after the Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy amid an onslaught of child sexual abuse cases.
Victims are each entitled to up to $2.7 million from the fund, according to court documents, depending on the severity of the abuse they experienced and other factors.
But the settlement is designed to pay out less to men like Gayle, who grew up in states where their claims would likely be barred because too much time has gone by.
Some say the settlement as structured is generous—offering the men more than they likely would receive had they pursued their claims in state court. But others say it creates a patchwork where men abused in one state receive a fraction of what those in others receive.
Men in more than 30 states will likely have their awards reduced based on local statutes of limitation.