Montana Supreme Court declines to intervene in Boy Scout rape case

KALISPELL, Mont. – The Montana Supreme Court has declined to rule in a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America by women who were raped by a scout leader as children.

William Leininger Jr. was convicted in 1976 of raping six female Explorer Scouts. He died in 2002.

The high court on Tuesday rejected the Boy Scouts’ request that it dismiss the women’s case because time had run out to file a lawsuit.

The five women plaintiffs say they only discovered within the last five years the connection between the rapes and the physical, mental and emotional harm they later suffered.

The justices say the issues surrounding the statute-of-limitations argument must be sorted in district court.

The Daily Inter Lake reports District Judge James Reynolds had previously ruled the case must go to a jury trial.