Federal judge weighs whether lawsuit over news reporter's death goes forward

Cristóbal Reyes, Orlando Sentinel on Apr 2, 2026

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ORLANDO, Fla. — A federal judge will decide whether to once again dismiss the wrongful death lawsuit against Charter Communications for the killing of Spectrum News 13 reporter Dylan Lyons, after a hearing Thursday in which she seemed skeptical of arguments to allow it to go forward.

The hearing took place after Senior District Judge Anne Conway tossed out the case “without prejudice” in October. That allowed attorneys representing Lyons’ family to refile their complaint alleging Charter — the parent company of Spectrum News 13, an Orlando Sentinel news partner — failed to protect Lyons the day he was sent to cover the killing of 38-year-old Natacha Augustin in Pine Hills.

While she didn’t issue her ruling in court, she was wary of attorney Ryan Vescio’s arguments on behalf of the late reporter’s family that Lyons was not warned of — and was too inexperienced to assess — the danger of being at a crime scene where the alleged shooter, later identified as Keith Moses, had not yet been apprehended.

“You ask any person on the street, and they’ll tell you a crime scene is dangerous,” Conway said. Vescio argued that a reporter from WESH who left the scene early “shows the virtual certainty” of deadly danger.

“If it was virtually certain,” Conway countered, “the WESH reporter might not have been there at all.”

Feb. 22 marked three years since Lyons was allegedly killed by Keith Moses, who faces a murder charge for his death in addition to the fatal shootings of Augustin and 9-year-old T’Yonna Major. The child was killed at her home nearby, shortly before Moses fired at Lyons as he sat in his news van. Moses’ next hearing ahead of the murder trial is Sept. 1.

Charter was accused in the lawsuit of sending Lyons to the scene without proper warning, training or safety equipment, in an unusual case that raised questions about the responsibility of news organizations to protect journalists covering violent crime. A financial disclosure filed in Orange County court last May stated the family sought at least $1.7 million in damages.

The lawsuit was initially dismissed after Conway ruled in a nine-page decision that the complaint failed to allege Lyons “was not aware of the danger of reporting at the scene” while authorities searched for Moses, despite claims that Charter “plausibly” knew he could be hurt or injured. Lyons’ family’s attorneys were allowed to file an amended complaint, however, that Charter countered was materially similar to the original.

Charter, which denies wrongdoing, argued in its motion to dismiss that any damages paid to the family for Lyons’ death should come from a worker’s compensation claim, not a wrongful death lawsuit. Key to its argument is the complaint failed to meet what’s called the “virtual certainty” standard, meaning that the company would have to know Lyons would be hurt or killed based on prior incidents or explicit warnings.

The lawsuit cited the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker among its claims, noting hundreds of instances of reporters being injured in the field. None of those examples aside from Lyons included Charter employees, nor have any resulted in lawsuits against the journalists’ employers — with one exception, the 2018 killings of several journalists at the offices of the Capital Gazette in Maryland, then owned by Tribune Publishing, the Sentinel’s parent company.

What’s more, the company rebutted, the lawsuit doesn’t claim that “any police department — or anyone at all — [stated] there was an ongoing threat” during the search for Moses.

“They’re relying on a general intuition” of Lyons’ supervisors of the dangers posed by the scene, “which is a slippery slope,” Paul Totten, the attorney representing Charter, said in court.

Whether law enforcement is liable for not notifying the community that a killer was on the loose is the question of a separate lawsuit related to Lyons’ and Major’s deaths, this time against the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.

That case, which also faces a motion to dismiss, remains pending.

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