Kobe Bryant’s widow,Vanessa has been awarded $16m (£13.6m) in damages over leaked crash photos of the US basketball star and his daughter.
Lifestyle Nigeria reports that the graphic photos of the helicopter crash that killed Kobe and his daughter Gianna were shared by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies and firefighters in 2020.
The 40-year-old widow said she had panic attacks after learning images taken had been shared.
Following this, a federal jury has now ordered the county to pay Vanessa for emotional distress.
Co-plaintiff Christopher Chester will also be paid $15m.
In January 2020 Kobe Bryant, 41, daughter Gianna, 13, and six family friends died when their helicopter crashed in California. Chester lost his wife Sarah and daughter Payton in the crash.
A report by the Los Angeles Times claimed that county employees took photos at the crash site and shared them with others, enraging the bereaved.
In November 2021, the county agreed to pay $2.5m (£2.1m) over the emotional distress caused to the two families who lost relatives in the crash – but Vanessa refused to settle.
Sobbing on the witness stand last week, Vanessa recalled being at home with her other children when she read the LA Times story.
Mrs Bryant said, “I bolted out of the house and I ran to the side of the house so the girls couldn’t see me. I wanted to run… down the block and just scream.”
Vanessa said she had felt “blindsided, devastated, hurt, and betrayed” by news of the leak and “[lives] in fear every day of… having these images pop up” on social media.
“I don’t ever want to see these photographs,” she said. “I want to remember my husband and my daughter the way they were.”
Jurors at the trial further heard how Sheriff’s Deputies and Firefighters took gruesome cell phone photos at the accident site and showed them to others, including at a bar and a gala event.
These employees “poured salt in an open wound and rubbed it in” with their actions, Vanessa’s lawyer Luis Li said during opening statements last week.
Meanwhile, a lawyer for the county unsuccessfully argued that “site photography is essential” and that the photos had not been posted anywhere publicly.
Kobe Bryant, a five-time NBA champion, played for the LA Lakers throughout his career and is considered one of the greatest players in the game’s history.