Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller announced that the State of Indiana would begin distributing its settlement money to victims and family members of victims from the stage collapse at the Indiana State Fair. It was announced on Tuesday, December 6, 2011, how the money would be distributed.
The fund for the occurrence is capped at $5 million under Indiana law. Payouts to victims range from $109 to $503,042. In order to decide how much each victim is to be paid, lawyers and other experts met in order to develop a plan to classify each injured person based on the injuries they sustained. Families of victims that were killed will receive $300,000 and surviving victims with physical injuries will get compensation for 65 percent of their medical bills that have been incurred through November 15.
Future medical expenses and psychological injuries are not covered by the settlement plan. For this and other reasons Tony Patterson and Paul Kruse - attorneys for several of the victims - are writing letters to Indiana legislators requesting that they pass legislation to increase the payout to the stage collapse victims.