SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (ABC4 News) – The parents of a University of Utah student murdered in 2018 while on campus has reached a multimillion-dollar settlement with the school.
Thursday marks two years since Lauren McCluskey’s murder on the University of Utah campus.
McCluskey’s parents and University of Utah President Ruth Watkins held a joint press conference Thursday morning to announce a settlement agreement in the McCluskey’s lawsuit.
President Watkins said that the school realizes that they didn’t respond to Lauren’s situation as they should have. Watkins said that they ‘failed Lauren and her family’.
It was announced in Thursday’s press conference that McCluskey’s parents will be paid $10.5 million in the settlement. An additional $3 million will go towards the Lauren McCluskey Foundation.
Additionally, a new indoor athletics/track and field facility is scheduled to be built on campus and will bear Lauren McCluskey’s name. McCluskey was part of the university’s track and field team at the time of her death.
“(We are) honored that she will always have a presence on this campus and help the athletes in the sport that Lauren was so dedicated to,” said Lauren’s mother, Jill, of the new athletic facility.
Overall McCluskey’s parents say they hope that campuses across the nation will continually become safer environments. “We acknowledge and applaud the many changes that have occurred at the university since her death and we hope that they continue,” Jill said.
