Rebecca Grossman’s daughter told a sheriff’s sergeant shortly after the allegedly impaired Grossman Burn Center foundation co-founder ran over and killed two children in Westlake Village that a front end-damaged vehicle belonged to her mother, the sergeant testified Tuesday.
Addressing a Van Nuys Superior Court civil jury, Sgt. Grehtel Barraza said the remark was make by Grossman’s daughter, Alexis Grossman. In response to the statement, a colleague of Barraza’s told Alexis Grossman to step back, according to the sergeant.
Barraza said she was a deputy at the time as well as a field training officer who was schooling a deputy that night when she was called to initially direct traffic at the accident scene.
Barraza said that because she and Rebecca Grossman are both females, she was later asked by her by supervisors to travel up to where Grossman would ultimately be given a field sobriety test which Barraza witnessed. Barraza said she and another deputy then took Grossman to Los Robles Hospital & Medical Center in Thousand Oaks for a blood test administered by a nurse.
However, Barraza said that prior to the blood test being administered, she followed her training in obtaining a warrant, using a fax machine for transmission. Barraza further said she did not know what drugs, if any, Rebecca Grossman may have taken or whether she was too impaired to have been driving.
On Monday, Detective Michael Takacs, an expert in detecting impairment in drivers who works for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, said Grossman was indeed impaired.
Takacs also said that although Grossman’s blood-alcohol level was at the minimum California limit of .08 in which a person 21 or older is considered too drunk to drive, the limit is .05 in most of the world and .04 for commercial vehicle drivers in the state.
Takacs also said Valium can create an additive effect and the combination can increase one’s impairment. Grossman allegedly took Valium the night of the accident.
The plaintiffs in the civil suit are the boys’ parents, Karim and Nancy Iskander, and the boys’ brother Zachary.
The lawsuit’s co-defendants are Grossman’s husband — Peter Grossman — and Scott Erickson, her former boyfriend. Rebecca Grossman and Erickson had cocktails and the two later raced each other in their vehicles along Triunfo Canyon Road until they reached a crosswalk and the children were struck, according to the suit filed in January 2021.
Grossman, 62, of Hidden Hills, tried to flee the scene and likely would have succeeded had her vehicle not automatically shut down due to it sensing the massive impact that had just occurred, the Iskander attorneys state in their court papers.
The philanthropist then lied to law enforcement about her speed and how much she had to drink, and contended she did not know why her airbag suddenly deployed despite her vehicle sustaining massive front-end damage, the Iskander attorneys further state.
In March, a panel of the Second District Court of Appeal upheld the conviction of the Grossman Burn Foundation co-founder. Grossman was found guilty Feb. 23, 2024, of two counts each of second-degree murder and vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one count of hit-and-run driving in connection with the Sept. 29, 2020, deaths of Mark and Jacob Iskander, aged 11 and 8.
She was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison.