The 1987 BSA “Ineligible Volunteer” file on Timur Dykes, a former Portland Boy Scout volunteer, is a telling example of how the BSA’s system of blackballing accused pedophiles failed to catch an unknown number of child molesters in Scouting.
Dykes was an Assistant Scout Master and then Scout Master with Troop 719 in Portland, a troop sponsored by the Mormon Church. In October 1982, Dykes was arrested for sexually molesting two boys in the troop. While the police were investigating his crimes, and before he was convicted, Dykes told the Bishop at the church that he had molested 15 other boys in the troop, in addition to the two who came forward.
The Bishop told no one about the other 15 boys. He did not tell the Boy Scouts of America, even though, as the head of the “sponsoring organization” of Troop 719, the Bishop was an official representative of the Boy Scouts. The trouble was, the BSA never told sponsoring organizations, Scout volunteers, or the families involved in Scouting that the BSA had an “Ineligible Volunteer” system, or that these ground-level Scouting participants should report accused child molesters to the BSA.
The only people who officially knew about the BSA’s Ineligible Volunteer system were the few employees in the national headquarters who kept the Ineligible Volunteer files, and certain paid Scout employees at the Council level. The people most likely to know about a volunteer sexually abusing or acting inappropriately with children had no idea that they should report such conduct to the national office of the Boy Scouts.
In the case of Timur Dykes, because the Bishop did not know that the BSA kept a national list of volunteers excluded from Scouting because of wrongful behavior, the BSA never learned that Dykes molested 17 Scouts in 1982. In early 1983, Dykes was convicted of molesting the two Scouts who came forward and was put on probation. In 1985, he was convicted of molesting more Scouts, in much more violent and serious ways, and sentenced to prison.
Only in 1987, when the BSA and LDS Church were sued by three of the boys Timur Dykes had molested in 1982, did the BSA add Dykes to its list of Ineligible Volunteers and open a “Perversion File” on him. Had the BSA told sponsoring organizations like the Mormon Church that the Ineligible volunteer file system existed, and trained them how to use it, Dykes would have been kicked out of the Boy Scouts five or six years before he was, and an unknown number of Scouts in Troop 719 would have been saved from his abuse.
Gilion Dumas Defended Eight Abused Boy Scouts Against Timur Dykes
I was proud to represent eight of these Scouts who were abused by Dykes in their civil lawsuit against the Boy Scouts. One of their claims went to trial here in Portland in 2010, resulting in the public release of over 1,200 of BSA’s Ineligible Volunteer files and a $20 million verdict in favor of my client. Shortly after that, we were able to reach a very favorable settlement on behalf of all of these men were brave enough to come forward and tell their stories. If only the BSA had been brave enough to tell the Scouting community about its Ineligible Volunteer system and how to report accusations, my clients may never have been hurt.
You can read more about the trial and release of documents on the O’Donell, Clark and Crew website.