Vanessa Bryant wants to publicly name deputies who ‘shared Kobe death photos in burning helicopter wreckage’
VANESSA Bryant wants to publicly name the deputies who allegedly shared photos of the crash that killed Kobe and the couple’s daughter.
Bryant‘s lawyers filed an amended complaint this week that added the four deputies and the LA County Fire Department to her civil rights lawsuit against the county and the Sheriff’s Department, according to the LA Times.
Bryant’s suit seeks damages for negligence and invasion of privacy and alleges that both deputies and firefighters took “unauthorized” photos of the crash.
The January 2020 helicopter crash in Calabasas, California, killed Lakers legend Kobe, the couple’s 13-year-old daughter Gianna, and seven others.
The amended complaint alleges that a Sheriff’s Department internal affairs report found that one deputy took 25 to 100 photos of the crash scene, and those spread quickly among deputies and beyond once they were shared.
In the bid to unmask the deputies, Bryant’s lawyers, led by attorney Luis Li, said that LA County could not cite a single case where a police officer was able to remain anonymous when being sued for a civil rights violation.
Li said that the case the county used as an example of why the deputies should be allowed to remain anonymous involved victims in a sexual assault case.
“Defendants try to equate the Deputy Defendants who shared photos of Kobe and Gianna Bryant’s remains with victims of sexual harassment and other abuse,” Li wrote in court papers, according to The Times.
Lawyers for LA County, however, argue that the deputies’ identities should remain anonymous as they may become targets for hackers if their names are made public.
“Not sealing the Deputy Defendants’ names increases the risk that hackers will seek out and try to gain access to the individual deputies’ devices to locate any photographs and publish them to the public,” county lawyers wrote in court docs.
“Plantiff should want to [seal] for this same reason.”
The amendment to the suit comes just weeks after the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the crash was caused by unsafe flying conditions, and the helicopter pilot’s decision to fly in extreme fog.
“The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause in this accident was the pilot’s decision to continue flight under visual flight rules into instrument meteorological conditions which resulted in the pilot’s spatial disorientation and loss of control,” the board confirmed earlier this month.
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“Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s likely self-induced pressure and his plan continuation bias which adversely affected his decision-making and Island Express Helicopters Inc.’s inadequate review of the safety and processes.”
Experts analyzing the crash suggested that the pilot, Ara Zobayan, may have felt pressure to get his famous passenger where he needed to go.
Still, the report said that the pilot should have been aware that flying in the conditions in Calabasas at the time of the crash was not safe.