Self-Help Author Settles Lawsuits Over Sweat Lodge Deaths for $3 Million

Insurance providers for James Arthur Ray, the self-help author convicted of negligent homicide in the 2009 deaths of three people during a sweat-lodge ceremony in Arizona, have agreed to pay the victims’ families more than $3 million.

The settlement was reached last year, according to the Associated Press, but its terms weren’t disclosed until recently, because the parties agreed to wait until Ray’s criminal trial finished. Ray was convicted of three counts of negligent homicide in June, and he recently began serving a two-year sentence.

Other lawsuits against Ray are pending, according to the AP.