Jaco Pastorius died broke after a club bouncer beat him, his estate nearly closed with debts, and his stolen bass took four years of litigation to get back

Jaco Pastorius was 35. On 11 September 1987 Luc Havan, manager of the Midnight Bottle Club in Wilton Manors, fractured his skull. Pastorius died after days in a coma. Havan was convicted of manslaughter and served under eight months. The club had no money or insurance, so a wrongful death claim had little value. Debts and a hospital bill were filed against the estate. His widow Ingrid asked a lawyer, Stephen Carlisle, to shut the estate down in 1989. Carlisle found Pastorius owned 100 percent of his song copyrights, and the estate paid its creditors from royalties. An heir later wrote that Pastorius left $659.21 in cash. Jaco Pastorius Inc., run by his four children and his brother, manages the rights. In 2006 the twins from his second marriage received $550 a month plus a yearly lump sum; the older children from his first marriage received more for pre-1980 work. The two branches ran rival websites. His 1962 Fender Jazz Bass, the Bass of Doom, was stolen from a Manhattan park bench in 1986. It turned up in a New York guitar shop in early 2006. The owner refused to return it, and the family went to court. In 2010 Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo paid to settle the case. He says he is the legal owner. In 2026 son Felix Pastorius plays the bass.