Judge OK’s Broncos GoFundMe distribution

SASKATOON A Saskatchewan judge has approved a committee’s recommendation on how to distribute $15.2 million raised in a GoFundMe campaign after the Humboldt Broncos bus crash.

Justice Neil Gabrielson agreed Wednesday that 16 families who lost a loved one in the April 6 crash should receive $525,000 each. He also accepted a recommendation of $475,000 for each of the 13 surviving players, some of whom suffered life-changing injuries.

The final payouts include an interim payment of $50,000 that was approved in August.

Many of the families had said that the money should be split evenly.

But the judge said he agreed with the committee’s reasoning that the families of the 13 survivors still have their sons, and can celebrate their survival and take pride in their accomplishments.

“The simplicity of ... the recommendation appeals to me and I adopt the reasons for the distribution recommended,” Gabrielson said in a Saskatoon courtroom.

The junior hockey team’s bus and a tractor-trailer collided in rural Saskatchewan while the Broncos were on their way to a playoff game.

The committee was made up of five people, including a retired judge, a doctor and women’s hockey star Hayley Wickenheiser. It based its recommendations on discussions with families over the last few months.

Kerry Gellrich, a lawyer representing the family of Logan Boulet who died in the crash, had argued the funds should be distributed equally.

“The Boulets feel they were a team before the collision and following the crash they have been brought so much closer together,” Gellrich said in court. “The Boulets feel it is not possible to value anyone’s pain or losses over another’s.”