Fox News journalist’s widow sues network over his death in Ukraine​on March 27, 2025 at 7:18 pm

Michelle Ross-Stanton, the wife of longtime Fox News video journalist Pierre Zakrzewski, has long questioned the circumstances surrounding her husband’s death while he was covering the war in Ukraine in March 2022.

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Why, she wondered, had the security consultant hired by Fox to protect her husband’s team – which also included Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall and Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra “Sasha” Kuvshynova – stayed behind when they went out on a reporting assignment to the Kyiv suburb of Horenka during a particularly dangerous moment in the war with Russia? And, if a consultant had been with Fox’s journalists, could they have administered lifesaving aid to her husband, who was badly wounded when their vehicle was hit by artillery?

“It’s not that I don’t trust Fox to give me the right answers, but I don’t trust anybody to give me the answers that I want to hear,” said Ross-Stanton, who embarked on her own investigation to figure out what happened and spoke to The Washington Post about it in interviews in 2022.

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Earlier this month, Ross-Stanton filed suit against Fox in Britain, arguing that the network did not adequately protect her husband and did not hold the necessary insurance to be able to fully compensate his family after his death. She is asking for more than 9 million pounds – approximately $11.6 million – in compensation.

Ross-Stanton’s suit argues that Fox is liable for the absence of a security consultant and for what she says was inadequate risk assessment prior to the trip. As such, she alleges the network failed “to determine, or heed, that it was not reasonably safe and would expose the Deceased and his colleagues to unnecessary risk of serious injury or death.”

She asked Fox whether an official from the company had approved his team’s reporting trip on the day he was killed. A day earlier, American journalist Brent Renaud was killed in the nearby town of Irpin, and the town’s mayor had ordered journalists to stay away from the area.

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Ross-Stanton’s suit also claims Fox’s journalists were driving in an unarmored vehicle at the time of the shelling, and argues that it was unsafe for them to do so in such close proximity to Russian forces. Additionally, the suit claims that the team lacked geo-tracking equipment that would have made it more likely for her husband to be rescued in time to save his life.

“As a result of the Defendant’s breach of contract and breach of duty the Deceased suffered personal injuries and died, and his estate and the Claimant have suffered loss and damage,” the pleading reads.

Zakrzewski, who was no stranger to reporting in war zones, was under the impression that Fox “had high-limit insurance in place to cover serious injury or death while he was reporting from high-risk conflicts for Fox News,” his widow alleges in the suit. Had the network held the proper policy, her family would have received “a substantial insurance payment.” (“We disagree with Michelle’s allegations and plan to file our response in May,” a Fox News spokesperson responded.)

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In response to a request for comment on the lawsuit, the network provided a statement about its appreciation for Zakrzewski. The network dedicated the London bureau where he worked to him in 2023.

“We remain devastated by the death of Pierre Zakrzewski,” the statement reads. “His extraordinary dedication to telling the stories of the war in Ukraine placed a critical spotlight on the atrocities there and we are forever grateful for his commitment to journalism and his ultimate sacrifice. We did everything humanly possible in the aftermath of this unprecedented tragedy amid the chaos of a war zone.”

Kuvshynova’s parents, Andriy Kuvshynov and Irina Mamaysur, sued Fox in March 2024, accusing the network of “recklessness and negligence” that caused the “wrongful” death of their daughter.

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They further alleged that Fox “engaged in a campaign of material misrepresentations and omissions to hide its own accountability for the disaster,” citing a 2023 book written by Hall that presented a “knowingly false” account of what happened, an accusation Hall and the network denied.

Fox News filed to dismiss that case late last month, arguing that in suing the network, Kuvshynova’s parents are seeking to undo a legal agreement that her father had signed after her death that provided “substantial payments” to her family. Fox claims that Kuvshynova’s parents also pledged not to sue the network.

“While we understand the grief and continue to mourn the loss of both Pierre Zakrzewski and Sasha Kuvshynova, we will respectfully defend against the inaccurate claims within this lawsuit,” Fox News said in a statement after the lawsuit was filed. “The safety of our journalists has always been our number one priority and we are immensely grateful to the Fox News reporters whether have covered the war in Ukraine and we remain committed to reporting from the region.”

Stephen Humphreys, a lawyer representing Kuvshynova’s parents, said that Ross-Stanton’s lawsuit is similar in nature to her clients’ lawsuit.

“Both cases come down to the same fundamental issue: That Fox did not meet minimum safety standards under the circumstances and tried to hide that from the surviving family members of Pierre and Sasha,” he told The Post on Wednesday. “They tried to hide it and failed, which is why they ended up getting sued.”

03-27-2025 02:25PM

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