Vanessa Bryant awarded $16m in suit over photos of Kobe’s crash

Kobe Bryant’s widow was awarded $16m as part of a $31m jury verdict on Wednesday against Los Angeles county after deputies and firefighters shared grisly photos of the NBA star, his 13-year-old daughter and other victims killed in a 2020 helicopter crash.

The nine jurors who returned the unanimous verdict agreed with Vanessa Bryant and her attorneys that Los Angeles deputies and firefighters taking and sharing photos of the crash victims invaded her privacy and brought her emotional distress, even though the photos did not become public.

Bryant’s co-plaintiff, Chris Chester, whose wife and daughter were also among the nine people killed in the crash, was separately awarded $15m.

The pictures were shared mostly between employees of the LA County sheriff’s and fire departments, sometimes in the context of entertainment, including by some employees who were playing video games, and others attending an awards banquet. The images of the crash were also seen by some of the employee’s spouses and in one case by a bartender at a bar where a sheriff’s deputy was drinking.

Vanessa Bryant tearfully testified during the 11-day trial that news of the photos compounded her still-raw grief a month after losing her husband and daughter, and that she still had panic attacks at the thought that they might still be out there.

“I live in fear every day of being on social media and these popping up,” Bryant testified. “I live in fear of my daughters being on social media and these popping up.”

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 county attorney J Mira Hashmall argued during the trial that the photos