District to pay landslide victims’ families

Published 10:07 am Tuesday, May 13, 2014

ST. PAUL — The St. Louis Park school district has agreed to pay $200,000 to the families of the victims of a deadly landside at a St. Paul park.

A Hennepin County district judge approved the agreements Monday. The district will pay $80,000 each to the families of 9-year-old Haysem Sani and 10-year-old Mohamed Fofana, who died during a school field trip last May.

The family of Devin Meldahl, now 11, who was seriously injured, will receive $40,000.

Email newsletter signup

In March, the families settled with the city of St. Paul for a record $1 million.

Neither the school district nor the city admitted liability.

Haysem family attorney Paul Godlewski says the Haysems plan to use the settlement to establish an orphanage in their native Ethiopia.