All but one of the ten wrongful death lawsuits filed by families of victims of the 2021 Astroworld tragedy have now been settled, a lawyer for promoter Live Nation told a court in Houston yesterday. That includes a case that was due to go to trial this week, but which was postponed as a result of Apple’s ongoing efforts to be removed as a defendant.
That case involved the family of Madison Dubiski, one of the ten people who died when a crowd surge occurred at the 2021 edition of the Houston-based, Travis Scott founded and Live Nation promoted event.
According to the Associated Press, Live Nation attorney Neal Manne told the court yesterday that the live giant had reached an out of court settlement with the Dubiski family. A legal rep for the family also confirmed this, adding that their case “is resolved in its entirety”.
Responding to that news, a spokesperson for Travis Scott said, “Mr Scott is grateful that a resolution has been reached without the need for a trial. The confidential agreement will honour Madison Dubiski’s legacy and promote improvements for concert safety”.
Hundreds of lawsuits were filed in the wake of the Astroworld tragedy in November 2021, by people who were injured, as well as the families of the ten people who died. The judge overseeing all the cases instigated a wide-ranging gagging order in February 2022, meaning that there has been very little reporting or out-of-court commentary on the litigation.
Nevertheless, it emerged in October 2022 that two of the families of those who died - Axel Acosta and Brianna Rodriguez - had settled their cases. A third settlement with the family of John Hilgert followed in 2023. Then, earlier this year, an SEC filing from Live Nation stated that in total six lawsuits filed by the families of those who died had been settled, as had 29 other legal claims relating to the festival.
Following Manne's update yesterday, the only wrongful death lawsuit remaining is that filed by the family of Ezra Blount, who was nine at the time of the tragedy and the youngest person to be killed.
A meeting is now due to take place next week to discuss a schedule for that case to get to trial. A lawyer working for the Blount family, Scott West, yesterday told the court “this case is ready for trial”, but Manne said he and lawyers working for other defendants need more time to prepare.
Although Live Nation and Scott were the key defendants in the Astroworld lawsuits, numerous other people and companies connected to the event were also named as defendants in many of the cases. Many of the listed defendants sought to get themselves removed from the lawsuits, some successfully.
However Apple, which was named as a defendant because it livestreamed Scott's headline set at Astroworld, failed to get the case against it dismissed. It then appealed that decision, resulting in the trial to hear the Dubiski case being postponed.
The out of court settlement that has now been reached by the Dubiski family settles all of their claims against all of the defendants in their lawsuit, including Apple.
In addition to the wrongful death action filed by the Blount family, Live Nation’s attorney confirmed that there are still hundreds of other lawsuits pending involving injury claims. Because each of those lawsuits involves multiple festival-goers, there are - according to Manne - around 2400 individual claims to deal with.