Jon Blake's life took a devastating turn on December 1, 1986, when he was involved in a car accident while driving home from the final day of filming for the 1987 movie The Lighthorsemen. As he was swerving to avoid a vehicle stopped on the wrong side of the road with its lights off, his station wagon collided with another vehicle, resulting in permanent brain damage that left him in a locked-in state until his eventual passing.
As his legal guardian, his mother sued the individual responsible for the accident, seeking compensation for her son's loss of potential earnings as a star in the United States. The New South Wales Supreme Court delivered a ruling on December 5, 1995, awarding Jon Blake $32 million in damages, citing evidence from actors, directors, and film critics who believed his career could have rivaled that of Mel Gibson's. However, the defence appealed, and the damages were later reduced to $7 million.
Jon Blake spent the remainder of his life under the care of his mother and a team of nurses at their home in Sydney until her passing in 2007. Following her death, his son Dustin took on the role of primary caregiver, and they relocated to a house on the New South Wales Central Coast in the months leading up to Jon's passing.
