Lubbock Firefighter Matt Dawson, who suffered a traumatic brain injury in a 2020 crash that occurred on duty, died on November 26, 2023.

Dawson will be familiar to Texas firefighters as the namesake of the Dawson Act, passed in May of this year, which extends workers’ compensation benefits to first responders who, while on the job, sustain a serious bodily injury that prevents them from returning to work.

In January 2020, Lubbock Police Officer Nicholas Reyna and Lubbock Firefighter Eric Hill were killed in a crash while working a crash scene. Dawson suffered a traumatic brain injury.

He would go on to champion the Dawson Act, which passed the Texas legislature this year. His family posted via Facebook that Dawson had died unexpectedly over the weekend.