A jury in Texas has awarded more than $3 million to a young man who was the victim of false racial allegations claiming that he racially bullied a black teen during a 2021 slumber party.
A judge upheld the verdict that the mother of the unnamed black teen and her attorney must pay $3.2 million to now 19-year-old Asher Vann, whose life was upended after a viral video on social media made headlines and sparked protests, ruining his life over a prank that served as the basis for yet another race hoax.
The jury found that Summer Smith and attorney Kim Cole intentionally inflicted emotional distress on Vann as well as publicized private information by whipping up hysteria alleging the racial bullying, and that the black kid was made to drink a cup of urine during the sleepover.
(Video: WFAA)
In a series of Facebook posts, Smith claimed that Vann and three of his football teammates humiliated her son, shooting him with BB guns and taunting him with racial slurs when he was 14 and attending Haggard Middle School in Plano. The posts ignited a racial firestorm with a GoFundMe account set up by Cole raising over $100,000 for Smith and her son.
“This is not a prank,” the mom said at the time. “This is beyond bullying. You are evil. They are evil.”
According to the Dallas Morning News, “A link to a Change.org petition included in some of the posts identified the students by their full names, while one to a GoFundMe page urged viewers to send donations to pay for counseling services and private school tuition for Smith’s son.”
“While at the sleepover, several white students shot [Smith’s son] with BB guns. When he was asleep, they slapped him, all while calling him racial slurs. And worse yet, they forced [Smith’s son] to drink their urine. [Smith’s son] had been subjected to the unthinkable. He is in need of therapy and is planning to change to a private school,” a fundraiser read, according to left-leaning website Mediaite.
Smith’s posts “sent Vann’s life into a tailspin from which he wouldn’t recover for years,” the Dallas Morning News reported.
“It was horrible,” the teenager told the outlet. “I lost all my friends. I really felt alone.”
But jurors sided with the young man, finding that the incident wasn’t racially motivated and that the “childish and immature” prank had been planned for whoever fell asleep first.
“Ultimately, [Smith’s son] went to sleep first. The group, as they had planned for whoever fell asleep first, decided to play a childish and immature prank on their friend,” Vann’s lawsuit stated. “In short, the boys filled a cup with apple juice, and (to the extent they could), one or more boys dribbled a bit of urine into the juice. They then woke up their cohort, offered him the icky brew, which he appeared to take a brief sip (swallowing none),” the suit read, according to Law & Crime.
“It was immature. It was stupid. It was nasty,” Vann told WFAA. “But it’s – that’s not who I am, and that’s not me today.”
“We played a prank,” he explained that there was nothing racial about the incident. “The first one who went to sleep got pranked.”
“To me this entire verdict runs afoul of anything decent or just,” Cole told WFAA, accusing Vann of “trying to rewrite history.”
“We put on evidence that they knew the things that they were saying were not true and that they persisted in it because they were raising money off of that narrative,” Vann’s lawyer said.
Smith said that she plans to appeal the verdict.
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