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According to Boy Scout and court records, there were at least 15 known, accused pedophiles volunteering as Boy Scout leaders in Idaho from the 1960s through the early 2000s. At least nine of these men were members of the LDS Church or involved with Mormon-sponsored Boy Scout troops.
Of these 15 men, the Boy Scouts of America had nine of them on its “Ineligible Volunteer” list, meaning that the BSA opened what it called a “Perversion File” on each of these men. These Perversion Files contained accusations that these nine men had sexually molested or exploited boys involved in Idaho Scout troops.
Tragically, the Boy Scouts kept these Perversion Files secret, using them only internally as a black ball list to try to keep the accused men from officially volunteering with the BSA. The families involved with these Idaho troop were kept in the dark. The Boy Scouts did not tell the families or other adult volunteers that the men had been accused of sexually abusing boys, why the men left the troops, or that the Perversion File system existed. Because the BSA covered up this key information, the people who needed it most did not have it and were unable to protect their children.
The nine Boy Scout volunteers accused of sexually molesting Scouts in Idaho who appear in the publicly available Perversion Files are:
- Larren Arnold
- Robert Elliott
- Dennis Empey
- Billy Joe Hagan
- Arthur Kringbaum
- James Powell
- Barry Pringle
- James Schmidt
- Sidney Spencer
Court files and other public records identified six other Boy Scout volunteers accused of sexually abusing Boy Scouts in Idaho since the 1960s:
- Douglas Bowin
- Jeff Hardin
- Lawrence Libey
- Ronald Jenkins
- Robert Scott Price
- Brad Stowell
In recent years, lawsuits have been filed in Idaho by survivors of sexual abuse in Scouting. These lawsuit allege that the Boy Scouts committed fraud because, for decades, the BSA mislead families about the safety of Scouting by covering up the known danger of sexual molesters targeting Scouting to obtain access to victims. The lawsuits allege that BSA knew from the thousands of Perversion Files it kept on Scout volunteers accused of sexual misconduct with children that Scouts were at risk, but intentionally chose to keep this information hidden from parents, volunteers, and sponsoring organizations.
Based on our experience with these kinds of child abuse cases, we suspect two things. First, that the brave men who filed the previous Idaho lawsuit were not alone – the accused pedophiles listed above had many other victims. Second, that there were other Scout leaders in Idaho who sexually molested, sexually exploited, or took sexual advantage of boys in their troops, but were never caught. Most children, especially boys, who are sexually abused never tell anyone.
