Live Nation sued by Las Vegas festival survivors for refunds

Live Nation Entertainment is being sued in a class action by survivors of the Las Vegas concert shootings for refunds across the board.

22,000 people paid between $200 and $300 to attend the September 29 – October 1 Route 91 Harvest country festival.

In the deadliest mass shooting in America, 58 of them were killed and 500 injured by Stephen Paddock, who later killed himself.

The gunman somehow managed to get an arsenal of guns into his 32nd floor Mandalay Bay hotel room overlooking the festival site, without being detected.

In the immediate wake of the massacre, Live Nation issued a statement, promising to “do everything in our power to support the victims and their families through the aftermath of this horrendous event.”

However five months later, only some people have received refunds.

Craig Eiland, one of the attorneys involved in filing the class action told Fox News, "As we were interviewing several hundred of our clients, we realized some had received refunds and some had not.

“It didn’t matter if they were family members of deceased, gunshot victims or traumatized because of the shooting and their escape.

“The only factor was that those that heard about a refund through Facebook or friends and demanded a refund, got it.

“So we decided to make one demand on behalf of everyone."

Another lawyer Mark Ronson, who filed on behalf of a couple from Orange County in California (where a significant number of festival patrons came from), said, "We didn’t think it was fair that some who privately asked for refunds got them, when really everybody who bought a ticket deserves a full refund."

Live Nation does not comment on pending legal cases.

Attorney David Di Pietro, who is not affiliated with the lawsuit, told Fox News that the Route 91 case was an interesting one.

They could argue that the concert did not go ahead on the grounds there may not have been insufficient security.

But Live Nation’s liability would depend on whether a court believes how foreseeable the shooting was.

Five negligence lawsuits filed in the LA Superior Court last October included Live Nation as a defendant, along with Mandalay Bay, hotel operator MGM Resorts and Paddock’s estate.

The largest was on 450 who were injured or were traumatised at seeing people being shot.

The other four were brought by families of people who were killed or severely injured.

They claimed Live Nation was negligent for failing to provide adequate exits and properly trained staff for an emergency.

Mandalay Bay and MGM Resorts were cited for failing to properly monitor Paddock’s activities, train staff members and employ adequate security measures.

However. Slide Fire Solutions, the maker of the “bump stock“ device Paddock used to shoot his weapon as an automatic and kill and injure as many people in a short time, was not included in most of the lawsuits.

A lawyer explained this was because most of his clients supported the right to bear arms.

“We want to focus on hotel and venue security, not turn this into a gun rights case,” he said.