Top Personal Injury Recoveries Confirmed Paid of 2024
Personal injury results from 2024, nationwide where the record shows the money was paid, or the defendant is an insurer or institution that pays, ranked by amount.
- $30 millionSettlementPaid
$30 Million Settlement for Odessa Woman After Hunt Oil Employee Hit Her Head-On While Impaired
Barbara Dalby, an Odessa proposal specialist and mother of three, secured a $30 million settlement against Hunt Oil after one of the company's intoxicated employees struck her head-on in 2019, leaving her with permanent spinal injuries and unable to work.
After trial: Paid by Hunt Oil's insurer.
Aldous Law and Goudarzi & Young, L.L.P.2024 · 116th District Court, Dallas County, TXRead the full story → - $26.13 millionVerdictReduced from $35.8 millionPaid
Iowa Supreme Court Affirms $26.1 Million Judgment In Fog-Related Truck Underride Crash
On March 19, 2020, an eighteen-wheel semitrailer driven by Clifford Takes for West Side Transport made an unprotected left turn across fog-shrouded Highway 151 near Anamosa, Iowa, and Margaret McQuillen's southbound car slid under the trailer. McQuillen, then 18, lost her pulse before paramedics arrived and was later found to have suffered a traumatic brain injury and roughly 100 skull fractures. A Linn County jury found Takes and West Side Transport 73 percent at fault and McQuillen 27 percent at fault, and set her damages at $35,793,475 in June 2024; the district court entered judgment for $26,129,236.80 after the comparative-fault reduction. West Side Transport and Takes appealed over closing-argument and damages-argument rulings, and the Iowa Supreme Court affirmed the judgment on April 3, 2026.
After trial: Reduced and affirmed. The jury returned $35,793,475 in June 2024, reduced to $26,129,236.80 for the plaintiff's 27 percent fault, and the Iowa Supreme Court affirmed in full on April 3, 2026.
Pickens, Barnes & Abernathy2024 · Iowa District Court for Linn CountyRead the full story → - $18 millionSettlementPaid
$18 Million Settlement for Tour Photographer Crushed by Runaway Forklift After Green Day Concert
Jake Chamseddine, a photographer working Green Day's Hella Mega Tour, was leaving Citizens Bank Park after the August 2021 Philadelphia show when a stagehand jumped off a moving forklift without setting the parking brake. The unmanned machine rolled down an exit ramp and crushed him against a concrete and metal post, lacerating his femoral artery and breaking his pelvis, femur, and lower back. He sued the Phillies, Live Nation, staging contractor Tri-State Stage Labor, and the forklift driver. After seven days of trial before Judge Caroline Turner, the defendants settled for $18 million on November 1, 2024, with Live Nation and Tri-State paying most of it.
After trial: Settled during trial on November 1, 2024. Live Nation and Tri-State Stage Labor are reported to be paying the majority, with the Phillies and other parties covering the remainder; the payers are institutions and insured contractors, which is why the row is tagged paid.
Stampone, O'Brien, Dilsheimer, Holloway2024 · Philadelphia County Court of Common PleasRead the full story → - $16 millionSettlementPaid
Seattle Public Schools Pays $16 Million Over Garfield Coach Abuse
Seattle Public Schools agreed to pay $16 million in October 2024 to settle a lawsuit from a former Garfield High School student who said two coaches sexually abused her over several years while the district failed to intervene. The suit named volunteer coach Walter Jones, who had been barred from district employment yet was allowed to coach anyway, and assistant coach Marvin Hall, who continued an abusive relationship with her into her college years. It is the largest tort settlement in the district's history, funded mostly through the district's insurance pool. Both coaches were separately prosecuted in King County Superior Court: Hall pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct with a minor in 2025, and Jones's child rape trial ended in a hung jury and a mistrial in December 2025. Paul Sewell and Tomas Gahan of Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna represented the former student.
After trial: Negotiated settlement, so no appeal applies. Seattle Public Schools pays $500,000 of the $16 million directly, and the Washington Schools Risk Management Pool covers the remainder.
Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna2024 · King County Superior Court, Seattle, WARead the full story → - $16 millionVerdictReduced from $40.7 millionPaid
Seattle Cyclist Awarded $16 Million After Brain Injury at UW Speed Bump
A King County jury found that a speed bump the University of Washington had known for years was dangerous to cyclists caused a 2020 crash that left finance executive Jonathan Spencer with a severe traumatic brain injury. The jury set total damages at $40.7 million and assigned 60 percent of the fault to Spencer and 40 percent to the university, leaving the state liable for about $16.3 million. Five earlier cyclist crashes at the same speed bump, including one that had already produced a jury verdict against the university, had put UW on notice before Spencer's crash. UW removed the speed bump two years after Spencer was hurt. Todd Gardner represented Spencer at trial.
After trial: Reduced and paid. The $16.3 million is the university's share of the jury's $40.7 million damages finding, cut after the jury assigned 60 percent of fault to Spencer.
- $6 millionSettlementPaid
Family Reaches $6 Million Settlement After Pretrial Detainee Dies of Malnutrition in Arkansas Jail
Larry Price Jr. spent just over a year in the Sebastian County, Arkansas jail awaiting trial on a terroristic threatening charge he could not make $1,000 bail on, and was found dead in his cell on August 29, 2021. He weighed 185 pounds when he was booked, and paramedics who responded to his death estimated his weight at about 90 pounds; the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory listed the cause of death as acute dehydration and malnutrition. His family's federal lawsuit alleged that Sebastian County and its jail medical contractor, Turn Key Health Clinics, LLC, ignored his deteriorating mental and physical condition, including discontinuing his psychiatric medication and failing to intervene as he ate and drank less over months in custody. Represented by Erik Heipt and Edwin Budge of Budge & Heipt, the family settled with both defendants in 2024 for $6 million, split evenly between the county and Turn Key. The county prosecutor filed no criminal charges over the death, and the case settled before trial with no ruling on liability.
After trial: Settled before trial, so there was no verdict or appeal. Sebastian County's $3 million share was paid from a public appropriation and its risk carrier after the Quorum Court approved the settlement on August 20, 2024.
Budge & Heipt, PLLC2024 · U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas, Case No. 2:23-cv-02008Read the full story → - $4.05 millionSettlementPaid
$4.05 Million Settlement for Family of Man Who Died Restrained Face-Down and Left Unattended in Jail Cell
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors approved a $4,050,000 settlement with the family of Akeem Terrell, a 31-year-old man who died in a county jail cell on New Year's Day 2021 after Phoenix police and sheriff's detention officers restrained him face-down and then left him motionless on the floor without checking on him.
After trial: This settlement resolves the claims against Maricopa County only. The City of Phoenix separately settled its own portion of the case for $800,000; the two payments involved different defendants and different conduct and should not be combined into a single figure.
- $1.25 millionSettlementPaid
Kansas Driver Settles Stop Sign Failure to Yield Crash for $1.25 Million
A 16-year-old driver stopped at a stop sign on Eisenhower Road in Leavenworth County, Kansas, then pulled into the path of a woman driving 55 mph on the right-of-way road, causing a July 2022 collision. She suffered a concussion, and daily headaches, dizziness, balance deficits and diminished concentration persisted for months despite a negative scan taken the day of the crash, which also exacerbated orthopedic injuries from a prior accident. The suit named the teen driver for failing to yield and the driver's mother for negligent supervision and training. A demand for the defendant's policy limits was made during litigation and accepted, and the case settled in September 2024 for $1.25 million without reaching trial.
After trial: Settlement of $1.25 million reached in September 2024, a recovery of the defendant's automobile policy limits after a policy-limits demand was accepted. The case settled before trial, so there was no appeal.
- $1.22 millionSettlementPaid
$1.2 Million Dram Shop Settlement for the Parents of a 17-Year-Old Killed by a Drunk Driver Doing 105 mph
A 17-year-old Old Bridge High School student was riding in a friend's pickup on Englishtown Road in Old Bridge at about 3:50 a.m. on July 6, 2019 when an Acura traveling an estimated 105 mph hit the truck from behind. She was thrown from the pickup and died at the scene; the Acura's passenger also died, and its driver later blew a 0.193 and was sentenced to 17 years for aggravated manslaughter. Her parents' estate suit claimed two Old Bridge bars served him while visibly intoxicated, and on January 10, 2024 the bars' insurers agreed to pay $1.1 million on top of $115,000 already paid by the two drivers' auto carriers, for a total of $1,215,000.
After trial: Settlements totaling $1,215,000 from four insurers, as reported by plaintiffs' counsel: $650,000, $450,000, $100,000 and $15,000. Three payments had been received by late January 2024; the $650,000 payment was pending when reported on February 9, 2024.
- $1 millionSettlementPaid
$1 Million Settlement After Troopers Repeatedly Tased Man Walking Beside Interstate 81, and He Died
Edmond Exline, 45, a paranoid schizophrenic apparently in the middle of a mental-health episode, was walking beside Interstate 81 near Martinsburg when three State Police troopers detained him. Tasers were deployed multiple times. He became unresponsive and was pronounced dead. The State Police settled for $1 million.
After trial: Settled and approved by the Kanawha County Circuit Court in 2024; final. The court separately allocated the proceeds among the decedent's son and four brothers.
All 2024 verdicts and settlements
202 results, largest first
Leavitt, Yamane and Soldner represented Maui wildfire survivors and victims' families in the $4.037 billion global settlement resolving approximately 450 lawsuits arising from the August 2023 Lahaina fire.
A federal court in Washington, D.C. awarded $1.956 billion to 114 survivors and Gold Star family members in Carlson Law Firm's second successful default-judgment lawsuit holding Iran liable for the October 2000 USS Cole bombing.
A Philadelphia jury awarded $725.5 million to former Mobil service station mechanic Paul Gill, who developed acute myeloid leukemia after years of cleaning car parts with benzene-containing gasoline and solvents, in what was reported as the largest benzene verdict in U.S. history; the court later added over $90 million in delay damages, and the Pennsylvania Superior Court affirmed the judgment in October 2026.
A Clark County jury awarded $550 million, $50 million compensatory and $500 million punitive, to Nimfa Escobia after her husband Marcial was killed by a driver traveling 107 mph while impaired by alcohol, methamphetamine, ecstasy, and marijuana.
A St. Louis jury awarded $495 million against Abbott Laboratories after finding the company failed to warn that its Similac cow's milk formula could cause necrotizing enterocolitis in premature infants.
The family of Greg Sharrigan, killed when a gas leak ignited at his Maynard home in September 2021, sued Eversource for $450 million, alleging the utility detected the underground leak three years before the fatal explosion and never fixed it.
A Philadelphia jury found that Monsanto failed to warn that Roundup could cause cancer and awarded John McKivison $2.25 billion. The trial judge later reduced the award to $400 million.
BASF Corporation agreed to pay $316.5 million to resolve claims by public water systems across the United States over PFAS contamination tied to firefighting foam. The sum is a $312.5 million settlement fund plus $4 million for notice and administration. Judge Richard Gergel approved it on Nov. 22, 2024, in the federal multidistrict litigation over aqueous film-forming foam. It is a class recovery shared among many water systems, not one plaintiff's award.
An Orange County jury awarded $310 million to the parents of Tyre Sampson, the 14-year-old who fell to his death from the Orlando FreeFall drop tower at ICON Park in 2022, in a case tried by Kimberly Wald and Michael Haggard against ride manufacturer Funtime Handels GmbH, which sent no lawyer or representative to the trial, leaving collection of the judgment from the absent Austrian company uncertain.
A St. Charles County judge entered a $300 million bench-trial judgment for a child, identified only as G.T., who was physically and sexually abused between the ages of three and five while in the care of Susan and James McLaurie, though one defendant died before the suit was filed and the only known insurance was a $303,000 policy.
An Ector County jury awarded $262.5 million to Isaac Sanchez, left quadriplegic when a drunk driver who had been served 19 drinks at Linx Bar and Grill rear-ended his motorcycle at a North Odessa intersection in June 2021.
A Richmond Circuit Court jury awarded $360 million to three former adolescent patients who were sexually abused by Dr. Daniel Davidow, the medical director of Cumberland Hospital for Children, during what he called routine femoral pulse exams.
Beasley Allen, representing Alabama on contingency, secured $220 million from opioid distributors Cardinal Health and Cencora after roughly 18 months of litigation, with every dollar directed to statewide opioid abatement programs.
A Bexar County civil jury awarded $210 million to the family of Andreen McDonald, killed by her husband in 2019, in what is reported to be the largest personal injury verdict in county history.
A Champaign County jury returned a $535 million verdict, the largest known single-plaintiff verdict in Illinois history, against a psychiatric facility that failed to prevent the rape of a 13-year-old female patient by another adolescent resident.
A Jefferson Circuit Court jury awarded $163,973,760 to Jilianne Warner, who was left permanently quadriplegic after a GEICO-dispatched tow truck plowed into her stopped car at highway speed; the verdict was later overturned on appeal.
A 2002 Dodge Ram 15-passenger van carrying 16 women from the We Are Living Proof sober-living program rolled over and caught fire on I-85 at the I-985 split in Gwinnett County on April 24, 2021, killing seven and injuring nine others. Families and survivors sued the van's driver, Chrysler and parent company Stellantis, the group home, and two repair shops, alleging a rollover-prone design, a defective steering system, and a fuel system that let gasoline ignite after impact. The claims settled in 2024 for a combined $162,000,000, described as the largest settlement from a single-vehicle wreck in Georgia history. Families and survivors were represented by several firms, including Shiver Hamilton Campbell and Beasley Allen.
A Clarke County jury awarded Leonard Street $150 million and his wife Tracy $10 million after finding that Daimler Truck North America and Western Star had defectively designed the cab of the 2023 Western Star he was driving, using a roof structure dating to 1995 and a suspension seat that did not hold him in place when the truck rolled.
On October 18, 2020 Ryann Early, drunk and doing about 79 mph in a 40 zone, crossed into oncoming traffic on Albert S. White Drive in Whitestown and hit Sherry Schnee head-on. She broke her neck and is quadriplegic. He went to prison. On January 11, 2024 a Boone County jury awarded her $84,000,000 and her husband $75,000,000. Early is an individual with no insurer identified, and his own lawyer said afterward he wished there were actual dollars behind the number.
A Nassau County jury awarded $141.5 million, including $125 million in punitive damages, against K&N Logging after an unvetted driver's 80,000-pound log truck plowed into stopped school-zone traffic and left a young child with permanent brain damage.
A 6-year-old girl was killed in the parking lot of a Slidell Catholic school. The school's after-school Run Club sent children as young as six along a route that crossed the afternoon carpool lane while cars were moving. Her 10-year-old brother watched it happen.
A Wayne County jury found Henry Ford Hospital negligent for a delay of over two hours in executing an ordered emergency C-section, awarding $120.9 million to a Detroit mother and her son, who was left with severe cerebral palsy and requires full-time care.
A St. Louis jury awarded $462 million against trailer maker Wabash National after its defective rear-impact guard failed and allowed a car to slide beneath a trailer on I-55, killing Taron Tailor, 30, and Nicholas Perkins, 23, in 2019.
A Clark County jury awarded $101 million against Progressive, $1 million compensatory and $100 million punitive, after the insurer delayed paying Hal Goldblatt's medical bills for months following a 2022 crosswalk collision that caused a traumatic brain injury.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.