Posted on 08/25/2022 5:32:00 AM PDT by Red Badger
A federal jury in California has awarded $31 million in damages to Vanessa Bryant and Chris Chester, whose spouses and children were killed in a 2020 helicopter crash, after Los Angeles County emergency personnel shared photos of their dead bodies.
The jury returned their unanimous verdict after four-and-a-half hours of deliberation. The nine jurors agreed that the photos of NBA star Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter, and other crash victims brought the co-plaintiffs emotional distress and invaded their privacy.
Bryant was awarded $16 million and Chester was awarded $15 million. Bryant’s attorneys did not specify a dollar amount that they thought their client deserved, but Chester’s attorney suggested guidelines that would have meant tens of millions for each plaintiff, The Associated Press reported.
According to evidence presented at the trial, a sheriff’s deputy showed a photo of Bryant’s body to a bartender as he drank. This spurred an official complaint from another man drinking nearby.
Firefighters also reportedly shared photos with each other at an awards banquet while others shared them with spouses.
An attorney for Los Angeles County said the photos were taken to assess the site moments after the crash and that Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva demanded they all be deleted when he learned the photos were being shared, The Associated Press reported.
During her three-and-a-half hours on the stand, Bryant said, in answer to a statement by county attorney J. Mira Hashmall about the photos being needed to assess the situation, that taking “close-up photos of people” wasn’t necessary.
“I think he could have just counted,” Bryant said, referring to Deputy Doug Johnson, who hiked through tough terrain into the hills in northern Los Angeles County to the crash site and shot the photos that were later shared.
Vanessa Bryant’s lawyer Luis Li told jurors that the close-up photos had no official or investigative purpose, and were mere “visual gossip” shared out of a gruesome curiosity, The Associated Press reported.
Hashmall agreed the photos shouldn’t have been shared but noted that they hadn’t emerged publicly, and had never even been seen by the plaintiffs.
The attorney argued that this meant the sheriff and other officials had taken decisive and effective action when they ordered those who had the photos to delete them.
Kobe Bryant was traveling with his daughter and seven others to a youth basketball game when the helicopter crashed into hills in Calabasas, west of Los Angeles, on Jan. 26, 2020.
Federal safety officials blamed pilot error for the crash.
A previous version of this article misstated the awarded amount. The Epoch Times regrets the error.
Ghouls.
Two local EMTs here in NW FL, were fired about two years ago for taking pics of accident victims aboard their ambulances and sharing them with each other.................
It was ghoulish, but $31M is far too much.
Sickos get off on human suffering. Like porn for some sub humans.
I agree that those who were showing off the photos should all be fired but $31M? Yikes.
They had some kind of One-Upmanship Game going on between them, one male, one female.......................
Don’t know the laws in CA but these headline numbers are almost always way above the maximum payout allowed by the state.
Most likely because the state is on the hook for a large portion of these lawsuits.
Now, WHO PAYS?
The persons involved, or the TAXPAYERS of LA COUNTY?.................
Rhetorical?
Only partly, usually the judge will divvy up the proportions..........................
The county of course after some sort of a settlement.
I’m glad they won, now they need to donate the 15 million to their church or the Red cross or some other deserving charity.
An absurd award by jurists unqualified to be making these decisions.
but $31M? Yikes.
= = =
And where is the $31M coming from.
Not the picture takers.
Because they needed the money. Hey, this happens all the time. Where is everyone else’s settlement?
Am curious why this was brought in federal court rather than state court. Any ideas?
I’m sure there is some legal beagle out there that can answer that................😉
I think it has to do with if the different parties to the case live in separate states, plus it has to be a big $$ issue.
So now is Kobe Bryant’s widow going to hustle every news network for every car crash they show.
Another federal jury in California hot coffee in the lap case.
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