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Friday, March 29, 2024 | Back issues
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US offers less than 10% of damages requested by Sutherland Springs shooting victims

The survivors and family of those killed in a 2017 Texas mass shooting asked for $400 million total, but the federal government argues they are due only about $32 million.

SAN ANTONIO (CN) — Nearly a dozen attorneys paraded before San Antonio’s federal court Monday, imploring the judge to award as much as $400 million to the 80-plus survivors and family members of those injured or killed in a 2017 shooting at a Texas church.

Department of Justice attorneys offered just shy of $32 million total to the almost 20 families petitioning for compensation in the aftermath of the Lone Star State’s deadliest shooting.

LMonday’s closing arguments come two weeks after the conclusion of a damages phase that lasted nearly four weeks of testimony, as survivors recounted the murderous rampage Devin Kelley carried out at Sutherland Springs First Baptist Church on Nov. 5, 2017.

The ex-airman killed 26 people and injured 22 more when he shot more than 500 bullets from an AR-15 style semiautomatic rifle and a handgun into the church frequented by his wife’s family.

This July, U.S. District Judge Xavier Rodriguez ruled that the Air Force was 60% responsible for the mass killing, which was carried out with weapons Kelley would not have been able to purchase if the Air Force had submitted Kelley’s criminal record to the FBI’s background check database, as the military branch is required by law.

For two weeks in early November, neurologists, physicians, psychologists, toxicologists and other experts clashed over mental health diagnoses, cost of continuing medical care and other lasting, monetary consequences of the shooting.

Attorneys representing the plaintiffs, led by Jamal Alsaffar of National Trial Law in Austin, slammed the government’s proposed damages payout. Alsaffar was apologetic for asking the victims to bear their scars to the court.

“The government was never really serious” about finding the true cost of the damages, Alsaffar told Rodriguez on Monday morning. “If you didn’t hear these stories and if you didn’t listen to Mr Holcombe and the other families suffering and what they saw, we wouldn’t have the evidence to counteract this inhumanity that we’re seeing right now.”

The lead plaintiff in the case, John Holcombe, suffered the loss of his wife Crystal and their unborn child, his parents Bryan and Karla, his brother Marc, an infant niece and two of his stepchildren.

The government proposed a $100,000 payment to Holcombe for the loss of his wife and $250,000 for her estate. Alsaffar was indignant.

“Mrs. Holcombe … moved her children in the seven-plus minutes when this horrible scene was happening, moved them around the church, tried to find in that awfully, terribly small space, until she ran out of room. And the last thing that she did was beg for her children’s life,” Alsaffar said. “Begged for their life, tried to cover them. And this man shot and murdered the children in front of her first, before shooting her in the face. The government thinks that’s worth $250,000.”

Attorney Dianiel Sciano — who represented three of the survivors when the lawsuit was filed in 2018, two of whom died this January — also objected.

“What is mental anguish? Mental anguish is to hear Mrs. Holcombe’s soul-felt scream of terror when she saw what she saw, which was a man dressed in full body armor, dressed with the very purpose of causing the damages that you can’t help or fix, that you have to compensate for,” Sciano told Judge Rodriguez. “His purpose was to cause pain, to inflict mental and emotional pain, torment and stress.”

In total, the Department of Justice attorneys offered $1.2 million to Holcombe for the deaths and injuries of his family members, plus an additional $808,900 for his own injuries. But multiple attorneys claimed that the government “does not understand family” if it will only offer lowball damages to the survivors.

“It’s not low, it’s just in line with proper precedent,” replied assistant U.S. attorney James Dingivan. “I don’t think it’s a wonderful situation, I’m not trying to demean any side. It’s based on precedent.”

Two issues appeared to be foremost on Judge Rodriguez’s mind. He repeatedly asked the plaintiffs’ attorneys to help him disentangle which conditions and injuries were caused by the shooting, and which preexisted the survivors’ experience.

He also expressed frustration with the government’s behavior — the Air Force never officially apologized for the mistake that permitted Kelley’s killing spree.

“Colonel after colonel, ribbon after ribbon and nobody ever said ‘I’m sorry,’” Judge Rodriguez said.

Counsel for the government reminded him that the trial is not a matter of retribution, but compensation; the federal government is immune from lawsuits seeking punitive damages, costs normally taxed so set an example in civil matters and deter future bad behavior.

Alsaffar returned to the stand for his rebuttal.

“Even though the facts of this case are so severe that it is almost impossible to find anything in injury cases that are equivalent to it, our numbers are within the range — if not lower than less severe cases recorded in Texas and the federal Fifth Circuit,” Alsaffar argued. “The government knows that. They know better.”

The lawyers have 10 days to file any motions while the judge takes their arguments under advisement. Rodriguez said the verdict will not decree the final amounts of damages, and that he will confer with the attorneys after he reaches a verdict, to determine how the final judgment will look.

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Categories / Government, Personal Injury, Regional, Trials

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