Federal Government, Utah Seek $14 Million From Boy Scouts For Wildfire

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- The federal government and the state of Utah sued the Boy Scouts of America on Tuesday for nearly $14 million to recover the costs of a 2002 fire at a Scout camp.

The lawsuit alleges that about 20 Boy Scouts ages 11 to 14 were left without adult supervision for a night outside an approved campground. Some of the boys built fires that were left to smolder and spread across more than 14,000 acres, the lawsuit says.

U.S. Attorney Paul Warner said the complaint seeks $13.3 million for the federal costs of fighting the fire and reclamation of the charred land in the Uinta Mountains. The state is asking for more than $600,000 to cover its firefighting expenses.

Utah law requires the people who start fires to pay for the cost of fighting them. State prosecutor Michael Johnson said the lawsuit is ``the last resort'' in defending taxpayers against getting stuck with the bill.

The Boy Scouts have not admitted responsibility for the fire. Rob Wallace, a BSA attorney, said Tuesday questions remain about how the fire started, and that it's possible people using all-terrain vehicles were to blame. The U.S. attorney's office says the Forest Service reported no ATVs were in the area at the time the fire started.

The June 28, 2002, fire started inside or near the East Fork of the Bear River Boy Scout Camp, about 35 miles south of Evanston, Wyo. The fire blackened 14,200 acres of the Wasatch-Cache National Forest and caused an estimated $150,000 in damage within the Scout camp to 12 camping sites, a rifle range, climbing towers, some latrines and several thousand feet of water lines.

Flames forced evacuation of the Scout camp, nearby campgrounds and summer homes, and prompted officials to close most of the north slope of the Uinta Mountains to the public.

The lawsuits claim the Boy Scouts, who were there to earn wilderness survival merit badges, didn't comply with its own rules on adult supervision. Instead, about 20 boys aged 11 to 14 were left without any adult supervision for the night outside an approved campground.

The documents state five scouts from Boy Scout Troop 149 built fires on a thick layer of dead and decaying evergreen duff and that neither adequate water nor firefighting tools were available to put out the fire.