Tyler Skaggs' family reaches a settlement with the Angels during deliberations in wrongful-death case
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The family of pitcher Tyler Skaggs and the Angels reached a settlement Friday, ending a contentious trial as jurors had begun a third day of deliberations regarding Skaggs’ drug-related death on the road with the team.Terms of the agreement, which followed 31 days of testimony and four years of legal wrangling, were not immediately available.Jury foreman Richard Chung said after the settlement was announced that the panel had agreed to award Skaggs’ family roughly $100 million when they were told to cease deliberations — $60 million to $80 million for economic damages, $5 million to $15 million for emotional distress damages and $10 million to $20 million for punitive damages.
Rusty Hardin, the Skaggs family’s lead attorney, told The Times that although he could not reveal the amount of the agreement, “the Skaggs family is extremely happy with the settlement.”Early efforts to settle the case had been unsuccessful, with the Angels’ legal team and its insurance carriers rebuffing overtures from the lawyers representing Tyler Skaggs’ widow, Carli Skaggs, and his parents, Debbie Hetman and Darrell Skaggs.As recently as Tuesday evening, after the jury had begun deliberations, the lead attorneys from each side met but gained little traction toward a settlement.The Seattle Seahawks’ comeback victory serves as a warning to a Rams team that has mostly done everything right on its way to becoming a Super Bowl favorite.The equation changed Wednesday when jurors asked the judge to read back testimony from experts on Skaggs’ future earnings had he lived.
The request suggested that that the jury had determined the Angels were responsible for at least a percentage of economic damages.The jury also asked whether it was charged with determining the amount of punitive damages, adding to speculation that it might hand the Skaggs family an award beyond economic and emotional d...