HARTFORD, Conn. — The maker of the rifle used in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting has offered some of the victims’ families nearly $33 million to settle their lawsuit over how the company marketed the firearm to the public.
Lawyers for now-bankrupt Remington filed the proposals late Tuesday in a Connecticut court, offering the nine families suing the company nearly $3.7 million apiece.
The families' lawyers say they are considering the proposals. Josh Koskoff issued the following statement in response to the company’s settlement offer:
"Since this case was filed in 2014, the families' focus has been on preventing the next Sandy Hook. An important part of that goal has been showing banks and insurers that companies that sell assault weapons to civilians are fraught with financial risk. Financial institutions like JP Morgan and Franklin Square learned that lesson when Remington went bankrupt. Ironshore and James River, two of the four insurance companies that once did business with Remington, deserve credit for now realizing that promoting the use of AR-15s as weapons of war to civilians is indefensible. Insuring this kind of conduct is an unprofitable and untenable business model. It appears that the other two insurance companies involved -- Chubb and Swiss Re -- have yet to learn that lesson and continue to stand firmly behind dangerous marketing and against the families. The families will consider their next steps.”
A lawyer for Remington declined to comment.
Remington made the Bushmaster rifle used to kill 20 first-graders and six educations at the Newtown, Connecticut, school in 2012.
The families say the company shouldn't have marketed such a dangerous weapon to the public.
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