odd situation. friend suing friend.?

ok so here is the deal.

I have two friends who didnt know each-other (one is from when i was in the Navy and the other from school after i left the navy.)

ok so friend A was moving but needed a truck to help move some items about 5 miles to his new apt.

I asked a friend of mine from the Navy if we could use his truck to move with. He not only offered his tuck he offered to help us move. Well anyway to keep this short we start the move and load up his truck with items from the house etc..

My friend from the Navy forgets to close the bed of the truck and gets in and starts to drive off. The TV and Subwoofer fall out and get broken. Obviously my friend from school is pissed off about the incident. My Navy friend felt bad about it and offered to take him to best buy that day and get him a new TV and Subwoofer.

you would think that would have solved the issue right? well we get to best buy and my friend from school wants an $800 subwoofer to replace is (at the time he bought it) $200 subwoofer stating "well they dont make that kind anymore so you have to buy a better one plus it has sentimental value" followed by picking out a nearly $4k TV. His TV was some off brand that at the time he bought it was A. used B. even brand new cost under $200 at wal-mart.

My Navy friend is not going to spend $5k on this guy obviously but was offering to buy him this package deal that came with a 32 or 36 inch HDTV Samsugn i think and a sound bar with subwoofer. it was on sale for just under $1k and not on sale like $1200 or something.

well they got into a big fight in best buy (verbal) they wanted me to choose sides and to be honest i had to side with my Navy buddy on principle and ontop of that i think he was being more than nice and fare.

so now my friend from school (shouldn't really call him a friend anymore) is going to take my Navy friend to small claims court for the maximum amount of money he can get.

Can me and my Navy friend win this even though he admits fully to not closing the tale gate on accident. i mean he offered reasonable solution to the problem and tried to resolve the issue that very day. I mean it was an accident he didnt try to break this stuff on purpose.