Cullman County, AL — April 16, 2025, Joey Broom, John Clark and Jeffrey Little were killed and three others were injured in a boat accident at about 7 a.m. on Lewis Smith Lake.
Authorities said two boats collided during a Major League Fishing tournament as a Nitro bass boat hit a center console boat in the Miller Flats area.
Joey M. Broom, 58, John K. Clark, 44, and Jeffrey C. Little, 62, died in the crash, according to authorities. All three of them were on the center console boat.
Three other people were injured in the crash, according to media reports.
Authorities have not released any additional details about the boat crash.
The final day of the Tackle Warehouse Invitational reportedly was cancelled after the crash.
Commentary by Attorney Michael Grossman
There’s a truism about the news that they don’t report on the planes that land safely. If something’s in the news, it’s there because it’s out of the ordinary, shocking, awful, or some combination of those three. Regardless of why something is in the news, the one question that everyone wants answered is “Why did this awful thing happen?” For the public (myself included), answering this question is simply a matter of determining whether or not there’s a way to prevent a similar crash in the future. That’s fine as far as it goes, but given my line of work, I know that the men killed in this collision almost certainly leave behind loved ones and the answer to how this crash happened isn’t just a matter of public policy, it’s much more. It’s about getting answers that can help provide closure to one of the worst days of their lives.
I’m struck that in all the reporting on this collision, none of those reports mention much about the investigation. I don’t know why, but that strikes me as akin to journalistic rubbernecking. Sure, we’ll show up and report on the awful thing, but we don’t have time to stick around an make sense of why it happened. That’s a shame, because my experience tells me that the more eyes are on an investigation, the more thorough it is. And boy, does this collision cry out for a thorough investigation.
Most people might think that this kind of investigation to be a straight-forward matter, but that’s far from the truth. Any accident involving boats introduces complexities that don’t exist in motor vehicle crashes. Further, there just aren’t as many boat crashes, which means the pool of qualified investigators is much smaller. Lastly, since this occurred at a tournament, investigators must also look at the policies laid out by tournament organizers to rule out that they didn’t encourage a dangerous situation.
My hope is that all these considerations are thoroughly accounted for an those affected by this awful collision get the answers and closure they need.
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