LOS ANGELES — Rebecca Grossman should pay $21 million and her former lover Scott Erickson $1.17 million in punitive damages to the family of two young brothers who were killed by Grossman when she and the former Dodgers pitcher raced their SUVs through a Westlake Village crosswalk, a jury decided Wednesday.

The decision ends a nine-week trial in which a jury decided the family of Mark and Jacob Iskander are owed nearly $200 million overall for the tragic September 2020 crash.

The boys, 11 and 8, were with their mother and younger brother when witnesses say vehicles driven by Grossman and Erickson came speeding toward the crosswalk. The couple had been drinking at a Westlake Village cantina and were heading to Grossman’s home to watch a presidential debate. Erickson testified that he avoided hitting the two boys with his Mercedes-AMG. But Grossman struck the two boys at 73 mph, according to expert witnesses.

Grossman was convicted in 2024 on charges including second-degree murder and is serving 15 years to life in prison. Shortly before the civil verdict, the California Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a petition by Grossman to review her conviction for double second-degree murder of the brothers.

The Iskanders sued Grossman and Erickson, and last week a jury found the pair liable in the boys’ deaths, awarding $176 million in damages to parents Nancy and Karim Iskander and younger son Zachary for wrongful death and emotional distress.

This week, Brian Panish, the Iskanders’ attorney, told jurors in the Van Nuys courtroom that they needed to award punitive damages for the couple’s “reprehensible” conduct the day of the crash.

“Just two words that you need to know: Punish and deter,” he said. “To kill people, to drive whatever the speeds were — some 80 miles an hour — with alcohol and drugs in a residential area at 7 o’clock during COVID, it doesn’t get more toxic than that. It is just a disaster waiting to happen, and of course it happened.”

Panish on Tuesday had asked for $20 million from Grossman and $1 million from Erickson in punitive damages.

Last week, the jury found that the pair — Erickson in his Mercedes driving just ahead of Grossman’s Mercedes — “acted in concert with each other in the course of their activities leading to the fatal collision.”

Jurors decided that Grossman acted with malice and oppression and Erickson acted with malice, oppression, or fraud, kicking off the punitive phase of the trial.

Esther Holm, Rebecca Grossman’s attorney, told jurors in closing arguments Tuesday that the evidence showed her client never intended to hurt the children and that $176 million already sent a message.

“You found she was speeding, you found she was racing ... but there was no evidence of deceit,” she said, adding, “She did not see the children, and there was no agreement to race.”

Holm told jurors that the question of punitive damages should not hinge on Rebecca Grossman’s wealth. Grossman’s husband, renowned surgeon Dr. Peter Grossman, was only a part of the case because he owned the Mercedes involved in the collision, Holm said, insisting that his plastic surgery company should not factor into the jury’s decision. The Grossmans were separated at the time of the fatal crash. Rebecca Grossman is a co-founder of the nonprofit Grossman Burn Foundation.

“There is nothing you can do in this courtroom,” she said, “that can bring Mark and Jacob back.”

Testifying during the punitive phase of the trial, former major leaguer Erickson told jurors, “I feel terrible about what happened. I feel bad about my actions and some of the terrible behavior I did.

“And no words can describe how I feel about what’s happened. For six years, there is not a day that has gone by that I haven’t been sad and upset and wish I’d done something different. I truly believe now if I had somehow been able to stop, I possibly could have saved their lives.”

Asked what could have been more morally reprehensible than his actions on the night of the deadly crash, Erickson replied: “I guess personally striking the children would be worse.”

Erickson told jurors he earned more than $46 million in Major League Baseball. Bad business decisions, a divorce and taxes left him with $9,000 in his bank account, a $13,000 MLB pension, a $242,000 retirement account, and $200,000 in equity in a Las Vegas condo. “I haven’t been able to get a job since the accident,” he said. He admitted he owned two black Mercedeses and had presented a different Mercedes to authorities than the one he was driving on the night of the collision, using the same license plate for the two vehicles.

Panish alleged that Erickson and the Grossmans had tried to conceal the total amount of their assets since the crash.

He questioned Peter Grossman about a series of trusts, homes owned in Texas, Georgia and Hidden Hills and the transfers of money and assets. He played recordings of prison calls between Grossman and her husband in which they discussed a Coinbase wallet with her bitcoin and another in which they discussed shifting assets to their children after the crash.

Panish said the surgeon’s testimony “weaved a web of deceit” about the family’s finances.

On Tuesday, in arguing for punitive damages, Panish said Peter Grossman was the only witness to deny his wife’s conduct and refused to admit she was a killer.

The day before, Panish had hammered the surgeon on the witness stand, asking: “Do you admit your wife killed the two kids? Do you admit it? Yes or no?”

“I admit that Rebecca was involved accidentally in the death of these children,” Grossman replied.

Panish then challenged him to “look that jury straight in the eye and admit that your wife killed those two boys traveling at an excessive rate of speed under the influence of alcohol. Can you?”

He asked the surgeon: “You have no apology whatsoever for your wife’s drinking and driving? Do you, sir?”

Grossman: “Sir, I have an apology for the Iskanders for everything that they’ve gone through.”

But Peter Grossman described characterizations of his wife driving drunk, racing and hitting the boys after going as fast as 82 mph in a 45-mph zone as inaccurate. She was tested several hours after the collision and registered a blood alcohol level of 0.08, the legal limit in California.

Panish asked the doctor if it was inconvenient for him to testify because his wife had killed two kids.

Grossman called out that comment as “very disrespectful.”

But Panish pushed again. “Can you tell the jury right now you’re totally sorry for your wife’s speeding, drinking and killing the kids? Yes or no?”

The judge directed the surgeon to answer, yes or no.

“Yes,” Grossman replied.

Last week, Grossman denied paying for a documentary about the case and said he was working with someone making one. “I showed my wife some rough footage,” the surgeon said. Under questioning by Panish, he acknowledged that Marla Maples, the former spouse of President Trump, “has been involved.”

In addition to the two counts of second-degree murder, Rebecca Grossman was convicted in 2024 of two counts of gross vehicular manslaughter and one count of hit-and-run driving resulting in death.

During the trial, Nancy Iskander testified that she began to cross Triunfo Canyon Road at Saddle Mountain Drive on inline skates with her youngest son, Zachary, next to her on his scooter. Mark, on a skateboard, and Jacob, also wearing inline skates, followed a little more than an arm’s length behind. She said Erickson’s black Mercedes narrowly missed her and her boys.

Grossman’s vehicle hit the boys. Mark’s body was found more than 250 feet away with the vehicle’s grille marks on his body. Jacob was found on the other side of the road, experts testified.

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