PORTLAND, Ore. — A jury on Monday awarded $20 million to the family of Freddy Nelson Jr., who was fatally shot in a confrontation with a security guard in the parking lot of a Lowe's Home Improvement in North Portland in 2021.
The guard, Logan Gimbel, was convicted of second-degree murder last year and received a life sentence in prison.
Nelson Jr.'s widow, Kari Nelson, also filed a $25 million lawsuit against Gimbel, property manager TMT Development Corp., property owner Hayden Meadows and three representatives of Cornerstone Security Group, the organization that employed Gimbel.
The defendants were not a unified front in the trial; TMT blamed Gimbel and Cornerstone, while Cornerstone admitted to negligence but said TMT had pushed for a security crackdown.
READ MORE: Portland security guard's 2021 fatal shooting of man in Lowe's parking lot goes to civil trial
Announcing its verdict late Monday afternoon, the jury concluded that all parties involved were negligent and found TMT Development responsible for 80% of the negligence that caused damages, Lowe's responsible for 10% and Nelson Jr. himself responsible for the final 10%. The jury found that Cornerstone and Gimbel were reckless in addition to being negligent.
The jury awarded $10 million in non-economic damages to Freddy Nelson's estate and another $10 million in non-economic damages to Kari Nelson.
The jury also found that TMT and Cornerstone were not jointly liable, and that punitive damages should be awarded to Cornerstone and Logan Gimbel, but not to TMT. The question of punitive damage amounts is set to be taken up when the proceedings resume.
Kari Nelson was sitting with Freddy Nelson Jr. in his pickup truck in the Lowe's parking lot on May 29, 2021 when the deadly confrontation took place. Court documents claimed there was an ongoing personal dispute between Freddy Nelson and the property managers and security company, and the security guards had been told to keep an eye out for him and harass him.
Bodycam footage of the shooting showed that Gimbel approached the truck and yelled at the couple to leave, before firing pepper spray into the truck. According to the Nelson family's lawyer, Nelson rolled down his window to retaliate with his own pepper spray, but Gimbel sprayed him in the face and then moved to the front of the truck and told them not to move.
Gimbel, who was not licensed as an armed security guard at the time, then fired shots through the windshield, striking Nelson Jr. and killing him. Gimbel later claimed he had acted in self-defense because he thought Nelson Jr. was going to run him over, but the civil lawsuit claimed that the Nelsons were complying with Gimbel's instructions and he fired anyway.
