Families of those killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting have negotiated a $73 million settlement with the corporation that manufactured the murder weapon.
On Dec. 14, 2012, gunman Adam Lanza murdered 20 students and six adults in Newtown, Connecticut. Lanza used a rifle to blast his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School after shooting his mother at home.
The settlement comes after three years of litigation with Remington Arms, the manufacturer of the Bushmaster AR-15-style rifle used to murder 20 first graders and six teachers at the Newtown, Connecticut, elementary school.
The settlement is a significant defeat for the firearms industry because the lawsuit circumvented a federal rule that shields gun manufacturers from prosecution by contending that the manufacturer's marketing of the weapon violated Connecticut consumer law.
According to Josh Koskoff's law firm, which represents the families of the victims, Remington's four insurers have all agreed to pay the entire amount of coverage available. Remington declared bankruptcy in 2020 and liquidated its assets.
"Today represents a watershed moment in our society's history, when our obligation to our children finally trumps the bottom line of an industry that enabled such atrocities as Sandy Hook," Veronique De La Rosa, whose son Noah was killed in the tragedy, said during a news conference.
Remington previously offered $33 million in a prospective settlement to the victims' families last year. In August, Koskoff stated that the offer was "grossly inadequate."
Along with the cash deal, the families' attorneys claimed Remington agreed to divulge hundreds of pages of internal business papers, including probable marketing plans for the weapon used in the murder - a provision that had been a major sticking point during discussions.
According to Adam Skaggs, general counsel and policy director of Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, this is believed to be the first instance in which a gun manufacturer in the United States has been awarded damages of this size in connection with a mass shooting.
In past cases, American gunmakers "have successfully used immunity and avoided culpability, emphasizing how momentous and unique the Sandy Hook outcome is," Skaggs wrote to NPR in an email.
Koskoff stated that the case focused on the marketing of the AR-15 rifle, which was originally designed for military and had a modest civilian market for decades. Koskoff added that sales increased from 100,000 AR-15s in 2005 to 2 million in 2012.
