A jury in Oregon has found the Boy Scouts of America negligent and awarded $1.4 million US to a former Portland man who was abused by an assistant scoutmaster in the early 1980s, following a three-week trial in which secret Scout "perversion files" were used as evidence.

The jury also decided Tuesday that the Irving, Texas-based organization was liable for additional, punitive damages that will be decided in a separate phase of the trial.

The Boy Scouts denied the allegations of negligence and said their files actually helped them keep child molesters out of their ranks.

Lawyers for Kerry Lewis, 38, the victim who filed the lawsuit, argued the organization was reckless for allowing former assistant scoutmaster Timur Dykes to continue to associate with the victim's Scout troop after Dykes acknowledged to a Mormon bishop early in 1983 that he had molested 17 scouts.

The Mormon church was the local affiliate, or "charter" organization, for an estimated one-third to one-half of the Boy Scout troops in the United States in the 1980s. The jury ordered it to pay 25 per cent of the $1.4 million in damages, or $350,000 US. The Boy Scouts of America must pay 60 per cent, or $840,000, while its Cascade Pacific Council must pay 15 per cent, or $210,000.

Dykes was later convicted three times of various abuse charges involving boys and served time in prison. Shortly before trial, he admitted in a deposition to abusing Lewis.

Lewis was not named in previous media reports, but he said on Friday he did not object to being publicly identified.

In court on Tuesday, he tried not to react as the verdict was read, but he gave his mother a long hug afterward.

Punitive damages loom

The second phase of the trial will determine whether to award $25 million in punitive damages. That phase will begin next Tuesday and involves only the national Boy Scouts after the jury decided the Cascade Pacific Council was not liable for punitive damages.

Kelly Clark, a lawyer for Lewis, introduced the confidential files to argue that the Boy Scouts organization was negligent because the files were not used to protect boys from alleged sex abusers but instead were kept secret.

Although the existence of "perversion files" kept by the Boy Scouts at its national headquarters has been known for a while, the Portland case is believed to be only the second time any of the documents have been seen by a jury.

The Boy Scouts has fought to keep those files confidential. But the Oregon Supreme Court in February approved the release of more than 1,000 files the Scouts kept on alleged pedophiles from 1965 to mid-1984 to be used in the Portland trial.

Chuck Smith, the attorney for the Boy Scouts, told the jury the files helped the Scouts keep potential pedophiles out of the organization. He also said the Scouts relied on local Scout leaders and volunteers to take action because they, not the national organization, were supervising the boys.