Man Sues Boy Scouts For Failing To Protect Him From Molester
By Samantha Abernethy in News on Dec 4, 2012 9:40PM
A man has filed a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America and the Chicago Area Council for failing to protect him from Thomas Hacker, the former scoutmaster who is now in prison.
Hacker was arrested in Indiana in 1970 for the sexual assault and battery of boys. Somehow he still wound up being scoutmaster for a parish in suburban Burbank, and the unnamed victim says Hacker molested him "on routine occasions during, before, or after various Scouting activities" in 1985.
“This is an egregious case of our client being let down by the informal and ineffective system Scouting had in place to protect its members,” said Chris Hurley, the victim’s attorney, in a written statement. “While BSA was promoting the wholesomeness of its programs, and its moral and safe environment, for decades it was secretly removing scoutmasters for child sexual abuse at an alarming rate. Unfortunately, once removed, many of them managed to sneak back in and continue victimizing boys.”
Hacker, now 75, was arrested in 1988 and charged with five counts of aggravated criminal sexual assault against three scouts. He is serving two concurrent 50-year prison terms. According to the Tribune, his defense attorney in the 1989 case called him "a classic pedophile - and sick beyond that."
Lawyers found information on Hacker in the Boy Scouts of America's so-called "Perversion Files" on ineligible volunteers, laying the foundation for John Doe v. Thomas Hacker, Boy Scouts of America, and Chicago Area Council Inc Boy Scouts of America (legal document available below).
Hacker's file showed information from the Boy Scouts' Central Indiana Council classifying him as an “Ineligible Volunteer” in 1970. Hacker joined the Chicago Area Council "in approximately 1983 or 1984," and the plaintiff alleges the organization did not conduct a background check. Furthermore, questions of the "ineligible volunteer" list rose after Hacker's arrest, and several Boy Scouts authorities "actively concealed" information.