$860 Million Verdict in Dallas Crane Collapse Death, Entered as $360 Million Judgment After Exemplary Cap

On June 9, 2019, a severe thunderstorm moved across Dallas. A roughly 200-foot tower crane at the Elan City Lights construction site in Old East Dallas toppled and crashed into the neighboring apartment building. The crane had been left in a fixed position instead of being set free to weathervane, the standard practice that lets an idle crane rotate so it points into the wind. Other cranes around the city that day were allowed to weathervane and stayed standing.

Kiersten Smith, 29, was at home in her apartment when the crane came down into the building. She was killed. Five other residents were injured, and many lost their homes. Smith's parents, Michele Williams and James Kirkwood, brought a wrongful death suit, joined by a claim from her estate.

The case went to trial in Dallas County in April 2023. Jason Itkin and Cory Itkin of Arnold & Itkin represented the family, with co-counsel Michael Lyons of Lyons Simmons. They argued that Greystar Development and Construction, the project's developer and general contractor, controlled the decision to leave the crane locked ahead of forecast storms. A central exhibit was the contract between Greystar and the crane's owner, Bigge Crane and Rigging, which the plaintiffs used to show where responsibility sat. The lawyers pointed to the dozens of other Dallas cranes that survived the same winds without falling.

On April 26, 2023, the jury returned $860 million, about $160 million more than the family had requested. The award split into roughly $360 million in compensatory damages for the parents and the estate and $500 million in exemplary (punitive) damages. The jury found Greystar liable and cleared Bigge Crane and Rigging. It ranked as the second largest Texas verdict of 2023.

After the verdict, Jason Itkin said the jury held the companies accountable and sent a message that "big companies cannot afford to be reckless with people's lives."

When the trial court entered judgment, it reduced the jury's $500 million in exemplary damages under Texas statutory caps, so the amount Greystar actually owed came in below the $860 million the jury returned, resting mostly on the roughly $360 million in compensatory damages. Greystar then appealed to the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas and fought over the supersedeas bonds it had to post while the case was reviewed, a dispute that reached the Texas Supreme Court in 2026. On a separate track, the company reached a 2024 settlement with a group of residents displaced or injured by the same collapse, and a disagreement over the terms of that deal sent those plaintiffs' claims back toward a new trial. As of 2026 the wrongful death case for Smith's family remained on appeal.