Live Nation has reached wrongful death settlements with relatives of two women who were killed at the Beyond Wonderland music festival in Washington three years ago when an active-duty Army specialist allegedly opened fire while high on hallucinogenic mushrooms.
In a notice filed with King County Superior Court and obtained by Rolling Stone, lawyers for the relatives of victims Brandy Escamilla and Josilyn Ruiz say the estates have “resolved and settled all claims” ahead of a trial set to begin next month. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Lawyers for the women’s families, Brian Panish and Spencer Lucas, as well as attorneys for Live Nation, did not immediately respond to Rolling Stone‘s requests for comment on Friday.
Live Nation still faces claims from a co-plaintiff, Lily Luksich, who attended the festival with the accused shooter, James Kelly. According to court filings, Luksich says she did not know Kelly had guns in his truck when they drove several hours to the Gorge Amphitheatre, east of Seattle. She alleges festival security failed to properly search Kelly and his vehicle for guns and drugs before he was allowed into the campground.
In a trial brief filed this week, Live Nation argues that Kelly “hid a bag of hallucinogenic mushrooms in his underwear to avoid detection by concert security” and that both he and Luksich failed to seek assistance at concert aid stations when he allegedly suffered a bad reaction to the drugs. Once the couple walked back to their nearby campsite, the brief says, Kelly retrieved a firearm from his truck and allegedly opened fire on two approaching women, Escamilla and Ruiz, killing them without warning.
Kelly then dragged Luksich through the campground while firing at security staff until they reached an adjacent field, the court filing says. He allegedly shot Luksich twice before he was shot by police. Kelly later told police that he thought “the world was ending” and that he needed to protect Luksich and get to their families, Live Nation’s trial brief states.
Kelly, who enlisted in January 2021 and was serving at Joint Base Lewis–McChord, was transferred from Grant County Jail to military pretrial confinement in February 2026 and faces multiple counts of murder, attempted murder, domestic violence, and drug offenses under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the Columbia Basin Herald reported.
Luksich’s lawyer, Tomás Gahan, says he and his client “are happy that the estate plaintiffs have found some modicum of justice with the settlement against Live Nation and the other defendants.” He says Luksich’s claims have not been resolved, and a trial is set to begin June 1.
“We are looking forward to a public trial exposing the negligence on behalf of Live Nation and its contractors that led to this horrific shooting,” he says in a statement shared with Rolling Stone. “The jury will still hear about Live Nation’s decisions to ignore its own policies regarding gun searches, and its absolute reliance on a skeleton crew of understaffed, undertrained, and inexperienced canine security team as the only layer of security tasked with keeping thousands of paying festival attendees safe. Predictably, they were unable to do so, and a mix of drugs and guns inside the venue led to extraordinarily tragic outcomes.”
