The civil sexual assault trial of Lakers star Byron Scott is on hold after the former player and coach filed for bankruptcy last week.
Hayley Dylan has accused Scott in a civil lawsuit of sexually assaulting her in the summer of 1987 when she was a 15-year-old student at Studio City Campbell Hall High School and he was 26 and married. The case was originally set to go to a jury trial Tuesday and then was pushed back to Oct. 12 because of a court scheduling conflict.
Now it seems the trial might be delayed further, if it even happens at all. When Scott filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy on Friday in the Central District of California, it triggered an automatic stay of the civil case against him.
Dylan’s attorney, Kerry Garvis Wright, told The Times in a phone interview Tuesday that her team plans to file a motion with the bankruptcy court for relief from stay to return the sexual assault case back to state court.
If the motion is not granted, Dylan would have to pursue her claims against Scott in bankruptcy court.
“We’re planning on exploring all of our options to get relief from stay and to have this case tried before a jury as soon as possible so that Byron Scott can face the consequences of his actions,” Wright said.
Scott spent 11 of his 14 NBA seasons with the Lakers, from 1983-93 and 1996-97. He has been head coach of four NBA teams, most recently the Lakers from 2014-16.
On his bankruptcy filing, Scott describes his type of debt as “alleged tort liability,” rather than a consumer or business debt. He also checked boxes that indicate he estimates his assets to be worth $50,000 or less and his liabilities to be between $1 million – $10 million.
In a statement emailed to The Times on Monday, Wright described Scott’s bankruptcy filing as a “pathetic and cowardly” attempt to “deprive his victim of her day in court.”
“Literally on the eve of trial, he filed for bankruptcy, thereby pausing the lawsuit,” Wright wrote. “Yet nothing has changed in the four years since Hayley Dylan bravely came forward and publicly disclosed that Scott had sexually assaulted her in a janitor’s closet of her K-12 school.”
She added: “Scott should know that when he emerges from his bankruptcy (if it is not summarily dismissed for being a sham filing), Hayley will be waiting for him, ready to go to trial and hold him accountable.”
According to Dylan’s complaint, Scott and other Lakers players were on campus for the filming of an instructional basketball video in the school gym. Scott and Dylan walked away from faculty members and the video production crew before the alleged assault occurred.
In May 2025, Scott’s attorney, Linda Bauermeister, said in a statement to The Times that Scott “believed the plaintiff to be over 18 and had no idea she would claim otherwise until 35 years later.”
Bauermeister did not immediately respond to questions from The Times’ request on Tuesday.
“Although obviously trying to avoid the legal consequences of his despicable conduct, Scott cannot run from the fact that he admitted under penalty of perjury that the sexual encounter took place,” Wright wrote in her statement. “His only excuse? That he thought Hayley was 18 and that it was consensual. But the evidence will show that Scott’s supposed belief that Hayley was 18 is neither credible nor reasonable and that what occurred in the dark, tiny closet was anything but consensual.”
Dylan filed her lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court in 2022, after the California Child Victim’s Act of 2020 extended the statute of limitations for survivors of childhood sexual abuse to file civil claims against their abusers. Her initial complaint listed “John Doe” and “Private School Doe” as the defendants; an amended complaint filed in May 2025 named Scott and Campbell Hall as the defendants.
Campbell Hall reached a confidential settlement with Dylan last month. The settlement amount remains under seal until the conclusion of Scott’s civil trial.
Staff writer Steve Henson contributed to this report.
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