Scout’s Family Settles Suit Over Lightning Death
The parents of a 16-year-old boy killed by lightning at a summer camp agreed to settle their lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America three days into the trial, their lawyer said Thursday.
The amount of the settlement was not disclosed.
Matthew Tresca’s family claimed the Scouts either knew or should have known a severe storm was in the area of the Pennsylvania camp on Aug. 2, 2002, when they dismissed 350 Scouts from the dining hall to their wooded campsites.
On Tuesday, a Scouting official testified that the Resica Falls Boy Scout camp sent children to their campsites during lightning storms instead of keeping them indoors as a matter of policy.
The plaintiffs and defendants agreed to keep all details of the settlement confidential, said the family’s attorney, Peter Korn.
Tresca’s parents sued the Boy Scouts of America, the Philadelphia-based Cradle of Liberty Council and three individual Scouting employees for negligence. It was not immediately clear whether the settlement involved each defendant.
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