Aaron Carter's estate has resolved its wrongful-death claims against Walgreens and Santa Monica Medical Plaza Pharmacy, closing out two of the defendants accused of fueling the pop star's fatal Xanax use before his 2022 drowning death. The settlement, announced per a court filing, leaves one defendant still standing: dentist Jason Mirabile, whose case is now headed toward a January trial.
What the Settlement Does and Doesn't Cover
Carter family attorneys announced that the agreement resolved all claims against Walgreens and Santa Monica Medical Plaza Pharmacy, according to a court filing dated October 15, as reported by Rolling Stone. The terms of that settlement remain confidential, the outlet notes, and the deal does not touch the estate's separate claims against Mirabile, which remain pending. Attorney Marc Lazo said the Carter estate was satisfied with the outcome, according to Billboard, which first reported the settlement.
Representatives for Walgreens and Santa Monica Medical Plaza Pharmacy did not return requests for comment, per the same account. This marks the second major settlement in the case: Carter's estate previously reached a confidential settlement with psychiatrist John Faber and Amen Clinics, with that psychiatry clinic becoming the first defendant to settle, back in May.
The Lawsuit's Core Allegations
Aaron Carter was found dead in a bathtub at his Lancaster, California, home in November 2022, at age 34, with drugs in his system. His former fiancée, Melanie Martin, filed the wrongful-death lawsuit in 2023 on behalf of their young son, Rolling Stone reports. The suit alleged that doctors and pharmacies overprescribed and supplied Carter with excessively high and unreasonably frequent amounts of Xanax, and separately alleged that pharmacies wrongly filled those prescriptions without checking whether he was abusing the drug.
According to Rolling Stone Australia, the 2023 complaint alleged that defendants negligently prescribed and supplied large quantities of Xanax, hydrocodone and oxycodone without checking the state's prescription-monitoring database. The same outlet reported that Walgreens dispensed 60 Xanax tablets on October 12, 2022, while the pharmacy dispensed another 30 tablets on October 25, 2022, just 11 days before Carter's death.
A Disputed Cause of Death
The Los Angeles County medical examiner determined that Carter drowned, with the effects of difluoroethane — compressed gas — and alprazolam, or Xanax, contributing to his death, according to the Los Angeles Times. Defendants have maintained a different account, arguing that Carter's death was caused by inhaled difluoroethane from compressed-air canisters rather than by Xanax. Amen Clinics attorneys specifically maintained that his death was caused not by Xanax but by inhalation of the gas, according to Rolling Stone's reporting, and defendants have separately argued in court filings that the Xanax in his system was insufficient to make him lose consciousness. A recurring defense position throughout the litigation, as Billboard has reported, has been that the real culprit was the gas rather than the medication.
What's Left Heading Into January
Mirabile is fighting the wrongful-death claims and is scheduled for trial in January 2027. His attorneys plan to argue, per pre-trial filings, that Carter was an absentee father and that his son cannot recover damages for lost financial support or companionship. They also want to call Department of Children and Family Services witnesses in connection with a custody dispute involving Carter.
Lazo said he was disappointed that the dentist continued fighting the claims, and added that the trial set for early January might not proceed if Mirabile accepted liability. In the months leading up to his death, Carter had been attending outpatient therapy after completing multiple stints in rehabilitation for substance abuse struggles that spanned much of his adult life.
Carter first broke through in the late 1990s opening for the Backstreet Boys, the group that included his brother Nick Carter. His 2000 album Aaron's Party (Come Get It) peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard 200, and follow-ups Oh Aaron in 2001 and Another Earthquake in 2002 both debuted in the chart's top 20. He later performed at New York's Gramercy Theatre in January 2012, part of a career that spanned child stardom to adult comeback attempts before his death.
