OT: Shooting victim sues 5 Ann Arbor bars
The 26-year-old Chicago man shot at a downtown Ann Arbor dance club is suing every bar at which the gunman drank before the shooting.
I thought this was worth posting as many of us have visited the bars in question.
April 10th, 2015 at 10:57 AM ^
Well then fuck it, he better sue every person who has made a violent movie or video game. He should probably also sue the gun manufacturer. And hell lets not stop there lets sue the store where the weapon was purchased. Probably should sue the bullet manufacturers also.
I know a lot of people want to get rich, and it sucks that this guy was shot, but there has to be a better way to do this shit.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:01 AM ^
From the article: "The lawsuit alleges LaBelle suffered numerous physical problems after the shooting, as well as fear, wage loss and medical expenses. The lawsuit seeks relief in excess of $25,000, the minimum required for a lawsuit to be heard in circuit court."
Very well could be that he needs the money to put toward medical expenses. If that's the case, then I think this actually is the best way to do it. But IANAL.
April 10th, 2015 at 12:52 PM ^
He is doing what is proper. You add as many defendants as you think could be liable and it is their burden to show how/why they aren't.
This sounds like you are just trying to dress up the phrase "throwing shit against the wall and see what sticks" anong with guilty until proven innocent. Respectfully, cant quite say i agree with that.
differs from mine.
GBLS.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:03 AM ^
April 10th, 2015 at 11:05 AM ^
I don't even know how to read, my phone just talks to me, and I to it.
But thanks for pointing out my shortcomings.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:58 AM ^
April 10th, 2015 at 11:06 AM ^
I've known at least a couple people that could blow a .17 and you would never know they were drunk at all. Alcoholics are pretty good at playing sober.
BS!
Who are you calling an alcoholic, and who is playing?
April 10th, 2015 at 11:24 AM ^
I know lots of people who got drunk and didn't shoot anybody.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:33 AM ^
it says he's suing all 5 bars where he drank. At what point was this dude "visibly intoxicated"? Was it at bar 2? Was it at bar 3? Would any bar in the world be able to remain open if you could not serve "visibly intoxicated" people?
I support suing the bro who shot you, but suing the bars he drank at smells of a hunt for money. Why not sue alcohol manufacturers for producing beverages that can intoxicate people? Why not sure gun makers for not having an attached breathalyzer that you need to blow into before firing? It doesn't end.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:43 AM ^
Agreed. People need to be responsible for themselves. If they drink too much and make bad choices, that's on them. I get very upset when bars are blamed for the actions of people coming in to drink. Is it smart to cut off a guy who has had too much? Yes. But if the bar decides not to, they shouldn't be liable for any action caused by that person. It wasn't the alcohol's fault he shot that guy, it was his.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:58 AM ^
People need to be responsible, but the last bar shouldn't have either let a visibly intoxicated in (0.17 is pretty impressive) or not let someone get that intoxicated if they were sober initially. Here in Pittsburgh, a bar was held partially responsible for allowing someone to get so drunk he proceeded to do 95 on a city street and kill some pedestrians.
April 10th, 2015 at 12:34 PM ^
No one is claiming that the shooter isn't responsible for his own actions. But bars and their servers have a well established legal duty not to overserve their customers. They know this and should be held responsible when they do.
There's a very good reason for this public policy. Notice that the person they overserve isn't the only one who's put at risk. Here it was the victim of a drunken shooter. More often it's innocent victims of a drunken driver. Running a bar isn't easy. There's a lot of responsibility involved. That's because they can often be our last line of defense against people harming themselves or others.
So, then we should have BAC meters at every seat..IMO, The culpability is NOT on the server - they can't be responsible for someone consuming too much. I agree with you that if it's blatently obvious they should stop, but we have no idea of his state when at these establishments, especially the first two they visited when he and the group were probably not drunk and quite possiblity under the legal limit.
Another person trying to get rich quick and what's one of the major cultural things wrong with America today.
Exactly this. Judging sobriety by actions of an individual can be completely subjective. We all know people who can drink a lot but you wouldn't be able to accurately judge their state just by looking at them.
Not only that - but it's not always the guy being "served" the drinks who is the one consuming them. If I got up to the bar and order a round of shots, I'm (usually) only drinking one of them. If the guy in question wasn't always buying his own drinks, or someone at the table who looked more sober kept saying "another round" then it's especially hard to tell who's drinking what and how everyone is doing.
good point. I get frustrated by these discussions because it minimizes society's emphasis on personal responsiblilty. Somehow the responsiblity of this man's behavior now extends to an establishment that makes money off of selling these things to customers - this is not something new.
Just pisses me off that things like these even get entertained in court, nonetheless have settlements associated with them. Pretty close to McDonalds hot coffee case, IMO.
April 10th, 2015 at 12:01 PM ^
since you can literally sue and win for anything in our insane civil legal system.
But as an emergency medicine physician with about 20 years of experience, I can state emphatically that you are wrong when you say "if dude blows .17 you should be able to tell." People (especially experienced alcoholics) can appear clinically sober with blood alcohol levels more than twice that level.
This is just one reason why holding bar owners or anybody else serving alcohol liable for the behavior of the intoxicated person is irrational. Then there's the additional problems of coingestants, time of ingestion (before or after leaving the bar), etc.
But unfortunately that doesn't stop lawyers and juries from faulting third parties.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:05 AM ^
April 10th, 2015 at 11:10 AM ^
I didn't read the article, I made an assumption and jumped to a conclusion. I apologize for being a dickwad.
I've been letting the liquor do the thinking lately. It seems to be working out.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:28 AM ^
and go to bed
Quit shooting and go to drink
April 10th, 2015 at 11:21 AM ^
$25,000 is the minimum jurisdictional amount to get into circuit court in Michigan (as opposed to district court), so the lawsuit will state he is seeking relief "in excess of $25,000" simply so the Court has jurisdiction over the case. He is presumably seeking far more money than that.
April 10th, 2015 at 12:25 PM ^
"The lawsuit seeks relief IN EXCESS of $25,000, the minimum required for a lawsuit to be heard in circuit court".
Given that the plaintiff lost his job, and the article is referring to "numerous physical problems", fear, loss of job, medial bills, he is going to be seeking six figures minimum. Especially since attorneys tend to take these cases on contingency, they wouldn't bother for <$25K.
Hopefully the bars have good liability insurance.
Above beat me to it.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:31 AM ^
I get your point, but AFAIK the servers that serve you alcohol are responsible for your actions. I bartended at Buffalo Wild Wings and management said that if we serve someone and they get a DUI or in a wreck, they can come after the person that served them the alcohol. Of course, they could've just been saying that to scare us into not overserving people (hell, it worked for me).
April 10th, 2015 at 11:00 AM ^
These types of cases are not as easy as they used to be.
Since there are five bars and not just one where the shooter was drinking, there are five insurance companies (each has a different policy). I would guess that there was probably no luck in getting each to settle out of court and everyone points the blame each way.
There will be a settlement out of court.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:46 AM ^
a judgment against the bars. The burden of proof is on the Plaintiff here. Prove that he was even there. Prove that he was intoxicated. Prove who served him, how long he was there, how many drinks he consumed. Prove that he was not inebriated prior to stepping in any of the listed bars. Prove that he did not drink in between bar visits, etc., etc., etc. While there could be some settlement, it depends on how strong the evidence is that bars served an already intoxicated person. This is a hard suit to win IMHO.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:51 AM ^
Agreed. They will need to get information about an establishment they weren't at by asking only people who have the best interest of the establishment in mind. Some of that info will have already been discovered for the criminal case, but for everything that wasn't, I have a feeling some people will have a hard time remembering the important facts. And asking a waitress to remember about how drunk one particular patron was on one night a year and a half ago will be very flimsy evidence.
but all you have to do is get a sympathetic jury and automatically the burden of proof swings the othe way.
And the bar owners lose no matter what... even if they "win" in court. They often suffer emotional stress from being sued. They lose time and money. The overall damage from such an assault through the legal system is often immense.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:00 AM ^
and i'll bet he's outside of the very tight timeline to even file that suit. total b.s.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^
He had several months to spare.
regarding the retention of counsel that usually gets them.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:01 AM ^
He wins a suit against Rush Street. He loses against the other four.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:03 AM ^
Is that because they didn't pat him down/it was the last stop so he for sure was visibly shitfaced?
April 10th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^
For the other four, the Dram Shop lability requires that the over-serving be the proximate cause of damage or injury, which would be reeeeally hard to prove. But for the establishment that let the hammered, armed guy onto the premises and didn't intervene when the fight started, that's a much easier case.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:04 AM ^
will probably settle. No way does their insurance company let this go to trial. And then their premiums are going to skyrocket, if their coverage isn't dropped completely.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:34 AM ^
Depends on the carrier. My wife is an insurance defense attorney and she has lots and lots of stories of insurance companies who go to trial against their attorney's advice. And it seems to be the same companies making the same mistakes.
April 10th, 2015 at 12:24 PM ^
And not very smart. Oh well, more money for you then!
April 10th, 2015 at 11:02 AM ^
How would he go about proving the guy who shot him was visibly intoxicated? Especially at one of the earlier bars on his pub crawl?
April 10th, 2015 at 11:02 AM ^
I don't dance.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:18 AM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
April 10th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^
I've known bartenders like that. they are horrible people that care more about packing their tip jar for the night than they do the well being of their customers.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:04 AM ^
I could see him having a case against the last bar, but not any of the others.
April 10th, 2015 at 11:06 AM ^
BW3, Cafe Habana, the Black Pearl, Conor's, and Rush Street? That's a run right there.