Paul Walker’s legacy 10 years after his death

Exactly 10 years ago, Paul Walker (Glendale, California, 1973), star of the blockbuster Fast & Furious franchise, died in a car accident. The actor was traveling as co-pilot in a Porsche Carrera GT that crashed into a pole at 100 miles per hour on a Santa Clarita highway, 50 kilometers north of Hollywood, and then caught fire. He was 40 years old. The driver of the vehicle was his friend, Roger Rodas, a successful financier at Merrill Lynch bank, who also died in the crash. That night, Walker had attended a charity event for the victims of Super Typhoon Haiyan, which hit the Philippines in November 2013, leaving more than 10,000 dead. Walker was the founder of the organization behind the event, Reach Out Worldwide, which he launched after the Haiti earthquakes in 2010, with the intention of providing aid to people affected by natural disasters. The tragic event, which shocked Hollywood, nevertheless overshadowed the performer’s good intentions. The story was too juicy. Although the actor was not behind the wheel, the epitaph seemed to write itself: he lived fast and died young.

Before his death, Paul Walker was in a relationship with Jasmine Pilchard-Gosnell, 23, with whom he lived in Santa Barbara, California. He also lived with his daughter, Meadow Walker, then a 15-year-old teenager from his relationship with Rebecca Soteros. Following his death, his daughter sued Porsche in September 2015. In this legal action, Meadow Walker accused the car manufacturer of skimping on safety measures and held them responsible for the death of her father who, her lawyers alleged, survived the crash but was unable to escape the flames as he was trapped in the vehicle. Porsche replied two months later, denying any liability and claiming that the actor voluntarily assumed the risks of riding in the vehicle and doing so at a speed that experts estimated at about 100 per hour. In April 2016, a judge dismissed that there were manufacturing faults in the car in which he died. That same month in 2016, Meadow Walker was back in the news when a judge ruled that the family of Roger Rodas, the driver who was driving the vehicle, should compensate her with $10 million, as a way of recognizing that the driver did bear some responsibility for the death of the performer, who was at the height of his career. “This amount only covers a portion of the money that Paul Walker would have earned if his life had not been tragically cut short,” Meadow’s lawyer explained to People magazine at the time.

In September 2015, coinciding with what would have been her father’s 42nd birthday, Meadow, sole heir to an estimated $25 million fortune, announced the creation of the Paul Walker Foundation, an organization dedicated “to acts of goodwill that empower young people and support the ecosystem in which they live.” “Reflecting on my father, I found myself reflecting on his passions,” Meadow herself explained through an Instagram post, which featured her and her father in a photograph. Paul Walker was interested in ocean conservation, having even starred in a National Geographic documentary exploring the life of great white sharks in the Baja California area. “I wanted to start this foundation because I want to share that piece of him with the world. I want to share that part of him with others.” Through the organization, Meadow has embarked on a number of philanthropic efforts, including scholarships to Marine Biology students.

Meanwhile, Meadow Walker has also been working on carving out a career for herself. In 2017, she signed with the prestigious modeling agency DNA Models, whose ranks also include Emily Ratajkowski, Kaia Gerber or Laetitia Casta. Since then, she has worked for brands such as Proenza Schouler or Givenchy. In 2021, she married Louis Thornton-Allan. The wedding made headlines in several media for a curious detail: the bride walked down the aisle on the arm of Vin Diesel, a close friend of her father’s and a co-star in the films that made him famous, as well as Meadow’s legal guardian after Paul Walker’s untimely death.

Vin Diesel is precisely the other person who has worked tirelessly to keep the actor’s legacy alive. On September 13, Walker’s 50th birthday, Diesel once again paid tribute to him on his Instagram, posting an image of them together: “For me this picture represents the moment I knew we would be brothers for eternity. January 2010, the night before you and I went to Haiti… the passion and joy you had to simply help people. You said first responders shouldn’t have to wait for anyone… and that you wanted to dedicate your life to that. First responders… that was your true self, and you were sharing it with me, your brother.”

As Cody Walker, Paul’s brother who now manages his organization Reach Out Worldwide, revealed last week in an interview with People, some of the cast of the blockbuster action saga have been very supportive of the fundraisers: “Vin [Diesel], Tyrese [Gibson], Ludacris, Michelle [Rodriguez], Sung Kang… they’ve been very supportive of the family,” he said. “We’ve done different fundraisers [...] We used to do these events called Game for Paul where we would do these big game charity fundraisers. Vin was a part of every single one of them. Tyrese and Michelle, multiple years, Sung, Nathalie Emmanuel, everybody just came together.”

Cody Walker, who this year had his first child, whom he named Paul, said it was very important to keep his brother’s legacy alive through the foundation, which was his brother’s greatest dream during his lifetime. “Since Paul’s passing, ROWW has continued to assist communities in natural disaster zones in 13 countries, with over 79 deployments and over 63,000 volunteer hours logged. That’s over $10 million in contributions to those in need through the generosity of incredible donors,” Cody Walker told People.

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