Stocks living out the rest of his life in Tucker Max [imagesource:stocksboyscouts]

In 1997, the small town of Lonoke, Arkansas, in the United States was shaken by the news that a local boy scout had murdered his mom, dad, and sister.

Heath Stocks was convicted for killing his entire family, with his reasons pointing to a dark and devastating situation in the boy scout community.

Stocks was one of several boys who was sexually abused by Boy Scouts leader and Lonoke community ‘Man of the Year’ Jack Walls in the 1990s, per an old Kark article:

“He was probably the worst pedophile in Arkansas history to use the Boy Scouts to groom and prey on kids,” Stocks says. “I was arrested for crimes that happened solely because I had tried to end my abuse.”

Stocks said that Walls abused him hundreds of times from the time he was 9 or 10 up until when he was arrested for killing his family at age 20. The boy scout said that the combination of the abuse and his parents’ reluctance to allow him to leave the scouts traumatised him, prompting the tragic ending of their lives.

Twenty-five years later, Al Jazeera‘s Fault Lines travelled to Lonoke to re-examine the case and its connection to one of the largest sex abuse scandals in American history.

In one of the largest sex abuse scandals in the United States, over 80,000 allegations of sexual assault have been made against the Boy Scouts of America. Families are still grappling with the impact, including in the small town of Lonoke, Arkansas where a local scout leader and prominent community member used his position to abuse boys for years.

In SCOUT MASTER, Fault Lines investigates the horrific impact this abuse has had on survivors, specifically Heath Stocks — a former scout who was convicted of murdering his father, mother, and sister.

You can watch the entire documentary on YouTube:

Stocks has been living out the rest of his life in the Tucker Maximum Security Unit, while his abuser Walls also serves a life sentence in prison in east Arkansas.

[source:aljazeera&kark]