Los Angeles County has agreed to compensate Kobe Bryant’s widow nearly $29 million after first responders published photographs of the NBA superstar’s helicopter crash. When their helicopter crashed into a mountainside near Los Angeles in January 2020, Bryant, the couple’s teenage daughter Gianna, and seven other people perished.
The Los Angeles Lakers star and his daughter’s mutilated remains were among the carnage that firefighters and sheriff’s deputies who arrived on the scene immediately captured on camera.
Bryant’s widow Vanessa filed a lawsuit alleging mental injury as a result of the images, which she believed would eventually go viral online. In order to end any litigation relating to crashes, Los Angeles County has agreed to pay $28.85 million.
Luis Li, Vanessa Bryant’s attorney, said in a statement–
“Today marks the successful culmination of Mrs. Bryant’s courageous battle to hold accountable those who engaged in this grotesque conduct.”
“She fought for her husband, her daughter, and all those in the community whose deceased family were treated with similar disrespect. We hope her victory at trial and this settlement will put an end to this practice.”
The settlement was described as “fair and reasonable” by Mira Hashmall, an attorney for Los Angeles County.
Hashmall said in a statement that “We hope Ms. Bryant and her children continue to heal from their loss,” according to a statement cited by CNN.
The $15 million in damages that a Los Angeles jury found Bryant entitled to in August 2022 are included in the settlement. During the trial, it was shown that some of the initial responders to the collision displayed the pictures to bystanders, including a bartender, and that one sheriff’s officer texted a friend while the two were playing video games.
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Chris Chester, whose wife and daughter also died in the crash, separately settled for nearly $20 million, according to media.
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