美国国家公共电台 NPR--Widow of Kobe Bryant was awarded $16 million in the trial over crash photos

Widow of Kobe Bryant was awarded $16 million in the trial over crash photos

Transcript¹

NPR's A Martinez talks to Los Angeles Times reporter Alene Tchekmedyian about the verdict in the trial over the sharing of photos of the helicopter crash that killed Kobe Bryant.

A MART?NEZ, HOST:

A court victory for the family of late basketball star Kobe Bryant. A judge has ordered Los Angeles County to pay $31 million for the handling of graphic² photos of the helicopter crash that killed nine people in 2020, including Bryant and his daughter, Gigi. Bryant's widow, Vanessa, will receive $16 million. The other plaintiff, Chris Chester, who lost his wife and daughter in the crash, will be awarded 15 million. Los Angeles Times reporter Alene Tchekmedyian was in court, and she joins us now. Alene, this case is about how first responders shared photos of human remains³. What did these police and fire officers do with the photos that the jury determined⁴ was so wrong?

ALENE TCHEKMEDYIAN: Yeah. That's a good question. So deputies and firefighters ended up hiking up to the hillside where the crash occurred and taking photos. And then we heard in the trial that they shared them amongst each other. We know that they were shown by a deputy to a bartender in Norwalk. They were shown among firefighters and their spouses⁵ during an awards gala at - in Universal City in what amounted to, according to one witness, to a party trick. They were passed around from one deputy to another as the pair played video games. And so during this 11-day trial, we heard from, you know, all these deputies about what they did. And they tried to explain why. And the jury decided⁶ that what they did was inappropriate.

MART?NEZ: How was this found out?

TCHEKMEDYIAN: So actually, it was an LA Times article investigation⁷ that published about a month after the crash and a month after this happened. At the bar in Norwalk, where the deputy showed photos, the bartender that saw them ended up going to another table and telling the patrons there about what he had seen. And one of the people that was sitting at the table was so disturbed that he filed a complaint to the sheriff's department. And so the sheriff's department got that complaint the next day. They ended up going down to the bar, getting surveillance footage of what happened the night before and seeing the deputy sharing the photos with the bartender. And one controversial thing that happened was that instead of, you know, launching a formal investigation and, you know, taking all the deputies' phones and investigating it, the sheriff, Alex Villanueva, offered all the deputies that were involved in this scandal amnesty. He told them if they came clean and deleted the photos that he - they would not be punished.

MART?NEZ: Alene, you've been reporting in Los Angeles, a lot on the sheriff's department for a while now. What did lawyers say about this case relates to the culture among first responders in LA?

TCHEKMEDYIAN: So the jury decided that there was a culture problem in the sheriff's department with sharing these types of photos among law enforcement officers. There was an expert who testified about death books that cops keep. And even the sheriff himself said in media interviews that were played for jurors that this was a problem in law enforcement, that they sort of collect photos of crime scenes and accident scenes as sort of a scrapbook of their careers.

MART?NEZ: The photos, thankfully, have never been seen publicly. They were shared within their circles. Was Vanessa Bryant worried? And the others in this case, were they - other plaintiffs, were they worried that someday they could be made public?

TCHEKMEDYIAN: Yeah, that was the biggest concern for them. So you know, lawyers and the county has argued that the photos were never publicly disseminated⁸. They were never posted online or published in the press or seen by the plaintiffs. But Ms. Bryant and Mr. Chester, the other plaintiffs, are arguing that we have no idea how widely they were spread because the county didn't do a thorough job investigating that. And now their biggest fear is that one day, they'll wake up and see it on social media.

MART?NEZ: That's LA Times reporter Alene Tchekmedyian. Thanks a lot for joining us.

TCHEKMEDYIAN: Thanks for having me on.

(SOUNDBITE OF NELS CLINE'S "THE BOND")

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

3 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

4 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

5 spouses   

n.配偶，夫或妻( spouse的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Jobs are available for spouses on campus and in the community. 校园里和社区里有配偶可做的工作。 来自辞典例句
• An astonishing number of spouses-most particularly in the upper-income brackets-have no close notion of their husbands'paychecks. 相当大一部分妇女——特别在高收入阶层——并不很了解他们丈夫的薪金。 来自辞典例句

6 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

7 investigation   

n.调查，调查研究

参考例句：

• In an investigation,a new fact became known, which told against him.在调查中新发现了一件对他不利的事实。
• He drew the conclusion by building on his own investigation.他根据自己的调查研究作出结论。

8 disseminated   

散布，传播( disseminate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Their findings have been widely disseminated . 他们的研究成果已经广为传播。
• Berkovitz had contracted polio after ingesting a vaccine disseminated under federal supervision. 伯考维茨在接种了在联邦监督下分发的牛痘疫苗后传染上脊髓灰质炎。