Kevin Ward Jr. Settlement With Tony Stewart: Terms and Objection

The wrongful death lawsuit brought by Kevin Ward Jr.’s parents against Tony Stewart ended in a confidential out-of-court settlement in April 2018, roughly three and a half years after Stewart’s sprint car struck and killed the 20-year-old driver at Canandaigua Motorsports Park. The Kevin Ward Jr. settlement with Tony Stewart was reached weeks before a scheduled May 7, 2018 jury trial, its dollar amount was sealed by the court, and Stewart paid personally because his insurer had refused to cover the claim.¹²

The Lawsuit Behind the Settlement

Kevin Ward Sr. and Pamela Ward filed suit on August 7, 2015, one year after their son’s death. The case began in New York state court in Lewis County and was quickly removed by Stewart’s team to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York, where Judge David N. Hurd took it as case number 7:15-CV-1023.³

The complaint alleged that Stewart improperly steered his sprint car toward Ward during a caution period on the night of August 9, 2014, and that his conduct was reckless enough to justify punitive damages.⁴ The filing followed an Ontario County grand jury’s September 2014 decision not to indict Stewart on manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide charges, a decision the district attorney tied to the absence of “aberrational” driving on the enhanced video and to toxicology results showing marijuana in Ward’s system.⁵ The civil case carried a lower burden of proof and different remedies, and the family pressed forward on that ground.

The Wards were represented by Texas trial lawyer Mark Lanier and his colleague Jud Waltman of The Lanier Law Firm. Stewart’s attorney was Brian Gwitt.⁶

The Ruling That Cleared the Path to Trial

Stewart’s defense team tried to end the case before a jury ever saw it. Their central arguments were that Ward had signed liability waivers through both the Empire Super Sprints series and Canandaigua Motorsports Park, and that the doctrine of primary assumption of risk barred recovery because Ward voluntarily accepted the dangers of sprint car racing and then compounded them by walking onto a live track.³

On December 12, 2017, Judge Hurd rejected both arguments. He found the waivers void under a New York statute that treats waivers between operators of recreational facilities and fee-paying participants as against public policy, ruling that the race was recreational rather than professional: “simply spending time and money on a particular hobby does not transmogrify it into a professional endeavor,” he wrote. On assumption of risk, the judge acknowledged Ward’s decision to leave his car heightened his own risk but held it “does not follow that this conduct gave other participants in the race, such as Stewart, carte blanche to act unreasonably in response.” A jury would need to decide whether Stewart’s driving during the caution unreasonably increased the danger.⁷

That ruling set the case on course for a trial in May 2018 with evidence that had grown increasingly difficult for the defense. Two safety workers testified they saw Stewart’s car move toward Ward. Jessica Zemken-Friesen, a fellow racer and Stewart’s ex-girlfriend, said in her deposition that she watched Stewart’s left front wheel turn to the right, toward where Ward was standing, and saw “the rear of the car stand up and the dust come off the rear tires as Tony hit the throttle.” A Gordon Engineering analysis retained by the Ward family concluded Stewart “intentionally caused his vehicle to move toward Mr. Ward by aggressively adding throttle input while counter steering through the turn.”⁸

Terms of the Settlement

A settlement notice appeared in the federal court docket on April 2, 2018. Both sides appeared before Judge Hurd for a settlement hearing on April 12, 2018, in Utica, New York.¹

The financial terms were sealed by the court, and lawyers on both sides confirmed the agreement included a confidentiality clause. The exact amount has never been made public.⁹ Reporting at the time noted a seven-figure judgment had been possible had the case gone to a jury.²

Whatever the number, Stewart paid it himself. He had already lost a separate court fight against Axis Insurance Company, which refused to cover the claim on the ground that the Empire Super Sprints series was not included under his policy. That left Stewart personally responsible for the full cost of the agreement.²

The lawsuit was formally dismissed on September 18, 2018. The judge allowed a 30-day window for the case to be reopened if the settlement terms went unmet. That window passed without incident and the case closed.¹⁰¹¹

Pamela Ward’s Public Objection to the Deal

Kevin Ward Jr.’s mother did not welcome the outcome. In interviews with Forbes shortly after the settlement, Pamela Ward said she felt pressured into the agreement and that the civil justice system had failed her. Money, she said, was never the point: she would have been “satisfied with nothing more than a $1 damage award” if the facts of her son’s death had been aired at trial.¹²

Ward alleged that Mark Lanier threatened to abandon the case if the family did not accept Stewart’s offer. She said she contacted 10 to 12 other attorneys, but none would take over a complex case a month before a scheduled trial given the cost and logistics of transferring the files.¹²

The pivotal factor, according to both Ward and the Lanier team, was a paternity test. The suit had been filed partly on the belief that Ward’s girlfriend was carrying his child, and providing for that child was a major motivation. When DNA testing revealed the child was not Ward’s, the firm concluded the case had lost significant “economic value” under New York law, which limits what parents can recover for the death of an adult child.¹²

Lanier and his firm disputed her account. Jud Waltman said the firm told the family they would proceed to trial if a settlement could not be reached. Lanier argued that the paternity result fundamentally changed the case’s viability and that the firm had obtained the highest amount it could under the circumstances. The Ward family also told Judge Hurd they lacked “the financial means to pay for a trial.”²¹²

Why the Case Never Reached a Verdict

Because the settlement resolved the case privately, no jury ever weighed the competing accounts of what Stewart did in that turn. Stewart maintained from the outset that the collision was “100 percent an accident” and testified in his deposition that his car fishtailed when he tried to drive under Ward.¹³⁸ The witnesses and engineering experts assembled by the Ward family described the opposite: a deliberate throttle input that steered the rear of the car into Ward. Both narratives are on the record, but neither was tested at trial. The confidentiality clause on the settlement means the price Stewart paid to end the case is also unknown, and the September 2018 dismissal made that outcome final.

1
USA Today. Tony Stewart, Kevin Ward Jr Wrongful Death Lawsuit Court Settlement
2
ESPN. Kevin Ward Jr Family Settles With Tony Stewart to Avoid Costly Fight
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vLex. Ward v. Stewart, 7:15-CV-1023
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13WHAM. Tony Stewart, Family of Kevin Ward Jr Reach Settlement in Wrongful Death Suit
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Yahoo Sports. Tony Stewart Not Charged by Grand Jury in Death of Kevin Ward Jr
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Autoweek. Lawyer for Kevin Ward Jr Dismisses Tony Stewart’s Response
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ESPN. Waivers Signed by Kevin Ward Jr Do Not Protect Tony Stewart
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ESPN. Family of Kevin Ward Jr Responds to Tony Stewart Motion
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Times Union. Tony Stewart Wrongful Death Settlement
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Autoweek. Judge Dismisses Wrongful Death Lawsuit Against NASCAR Driver Tony Stewart
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PACER Monitor. Ward et al v. Stewart
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Forbes. Victim’s Mom: Ultimatum From Lawyer, Paternity Test Led to Regretful Settlement With Tony Stewart
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ESPN. Tony Stewart Wrongful Death Lawsuit Settlement Hearing