Grossman Burn Foundation co-founder Rebecca Grossman — who was sentenced in 2024 to 15 years to life in prison for running down two young boys crossing a Westlake Village street with their family — can’t prevent attorneys from deposing her husband and daughter in the civil suit the children’s family filed against her, a judge ruled Monday.
Jurors in a previous Van Nuys Superior Court trial found Grossman guilty of two counts each of second-degree murder and vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one count of hit-and-run driving in the Sept. 29, 2020, deaths of Mark and Jacob Iskander, aged 11 and 8.
The plaintiffs in the civil suit trial, scheduled to start Jan. 5 in Van Nuys, are the boys’ parents, Karim and Nancy Iskander, and the boys’ brother Zachary.
On Monday, Judge Huey P. Cotton rejected arguments by Grossman’s attorneys that the one deposition taken of the philanthropist’s husband, Dr. Peter Grossman, by the plaintiffs’ attorneys was sufficient and that deposing their daughter, Alexis Grossman, would further traumatize a young woman already suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
“(Alexis) Grossman was able to testify on her mother’s behalf at the criminal trial,” the judge wrote. “She was one of the first people on the scene after the crash. She is the only witness to the presence of (co-defendant Scott) Erickson and previously has claimed he smelled of alcohol. Her disability does not disqualify her from appearing at deposition.”
In addition, the Iskander attorneys have shown that Peter Grossman may have relevant information regarding issues at the heart of the case, the judge wrote.
Peter Grossman is a defendant in the suit on grounds he allegedly granted permissive use to his wife to drive the vehicle used in the accident. He was previously deposed by the Iskander attorneys in June 2021.
Erickson, a former Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher, is Rebecca Grossman’s former boyfriend. The two had cocktails and later the two raced each other in their vehicles along Triunfo Canyon Road until they reached a crosswalk and the children were struck, according to the suit filed in January 2021.
Grossman, 62, of Hidden Hills, tried to flee the scene and she likely would have been successful had her vehicle not automatically shut down due to it sensing the massive impact that had just occurred, the Iskander attorneys state in their court papers.
Grossman then lied to law enforcement about her speed and how much she had to drink, and then contended she did not know why her airbag suddenly deployed despite her vehicle sustaining massive front-end damage, the Iskander attorneys further state in their pleadings.