Jury Orders Ed Buck to Pay $2 Million to Mother of Gemmel Moore

LOS ANGELES — Nearly nine years after 26-year-old Gemmel Moore, a Black gay  man, was found dead inside the West Hollywood apartment of wealthy white Democratic donor Ed Buck, a Los Angeles jury has ordered Buck to pay Moore’s mother $2 million in a wrongful death verdict that many in the Black community say was years in the making.

The verdict follows a civil trial in federal court brought by Moore’s mother, LaTisha Nixon, who has spent nearly a decade fighting for accountability after her son’s death in July 2017.

Jurors found Buck responsible for Moore’s death after hearing evidence that Buck supplied drugs and fostered a dangerous environment that contributed to Moore’s fatal overdose.

For Nixon, the verdict is about far more than money.

“No amount of money will ever bring my son back,” Nixon said after the decision. “But the truth was finally heard.”

Moore’s death initially drew little action from law enforcement despite warnings from community members who said Buck had a pattern of targeting vulnerable Black men struggling with housing, addiction, and financial instability.

Advocates say the slow response highlighted a troubling reality many in the community already understood: when Black lives are involved—particularly Black gay men—the urgency for justice often comes slowly, if at all.

On January 7, 2019 another Black man, Timothy Dean, died in Buck’s apartment under similar circumstances and a third, Dane Brown, almost died but was able to escape and call for help.  

Buck was eventually arrested September 17, 2019.

In 2022, Buck was sentenced in federal court to 30 years in prison for providing drugs that resulted in the deaths of Moore and Dean.

But the civil case brought by Moore’s mother represented another fight entirely — one focused on holding Buck personally accountable.

Attorney Hussain Turk, who represented Nixon, said the case forced jurors to confront what happened inside Buck’s apartment.

“This case was about responsibility,” Turk said. “The jury saw the evidence and understood that what happened to Gemmel Moore was preventable.”

Civil rights attorney Nana Gyamfi, who also represented Nicxon, said the verdict also reflects the power of sustained community advocacy.

“For years people tried to dismiss what was happening,” Gyamfi said. “But the community refused to let these deaths be ignored.”

The case became a national flashpoint because of Buck’s wealth, political influence, and connections to powerful Democratic politicians, raising questions about how long those factors may have shielded him from scrutiny.

For years, activists and community members protested outside Buck’s apartment building demanding accountability and justice for the Black men who had died there.

Journalist and political strategist Jasmyne Cannick, who spent years documenting the case and amplifying the concerns of victims and their families, said the verdict is the result of nearly a decade of work by families, advocates, and attorneys who refused to let the story disappear.

“This verdict didn’t just happen,” Cannick said. “It came after years of organizing, reporting, legal work, and community pressure to make sure the lives of these young Black men mattered.”

Cannick also noted that many of the men who shared information about Buck over the years did so quietly and at personal risk.

“Some of the victims never wanted to be in the public eye,” she said. “But they trusted that telling their stories could help prevent someone else from dying.”

Standing outside Buck’s former West Hollywood apartment this week — the same building where Moore died in 2017 — Nixon reflected on the long road it took to reach this moment.

“We never stopped fighting for my baby Gemmel,” Nixon said.

Attorneys caution that the legal process may not be over. Civil verdicts can be appealed, and collecting damages can take years.

But for a community that spent nearly a decade demanding that the deaths of Black men be taken seriously, the jury’s decision represents something that once seemed far from guaranteed: accountability.

Buck faces another civil trial in April on behalf of Dane Brown.