California Supreme Court Holds That a Bar Owner Can Be Held Liable for Injuries to a Patron When the Owner Had Actual Notice of an Impending Assault on the Patron
September, 2005
In Delgado v. Trax Bar & Grill, 36 Cal. 4th 224 (2005), the California Supreme Court held that a group attack on a bar patron in the bar’s parking lot was sufficiently foreseeable so as to impose a duty on the bar to provide measures to protect the patrons.
Facts
This case arose out of a criminal assault which occurred in the parking lot of defendant Trax Bar & Grill (“bar” or “defendant”). On Friday and Saturday nights in 1998, defendant employed two individuals who worked as security guards, commonly referred to as “bouncers.” One of the guards was stationed in the bar’s parking lot on those weekend nights. The guards' job duties included the following: (1) patrolling the parking lot to make sure that individuals did not congregate or drink alcoholic beverages there; (2) checking identification in order to keep out under-age patrons; (3) keeping a count of the individuals who entered so that the bar was not overcrowded, and (4) not physically intervening in altercations, but instead contacting the police by calling 911.
Plaintiff and his wife arrived at the bar sometime between 10:00 and 10:30 p.m. on a Saturday evening in November 1998. Plaintiff testified that he drank two beers before entering the bar, and over a period of 60 to 90 minutes at the bar, he drank one more beer. During that same time period, another patron, Jacob Joseph (“Joseph”), whom plaintiff was not acquainted with, and Joseph’s three or four companions, stared at plaintiff on several occasions, and plaintiff stared back. At some point before midnight, plaintiff decided to leave defendant’s bar because of the continued staring. Before they left, plaintiff’s wife approached the interior guard and expressed concern to him that there might be an altercation. Plaintiff and his wife were later attacked by Joseph and 12 to 20 other men in the parking lot. The jury found defendant liable and awarded plaintiff a total of $81,391.61. Defendant appealed, arguing that since there was no evidence of any previous criminal assaults on either its premises or in the vicinity, the assault on plaintiff was unforeseeable.
While defendant’s appeal in Delgado was pending, a California appellate opinion was issued which addressed an analogous situation. In Mata v. Mata, 105 Cal. App. 4th 1121 (2003), the California Court of Appeal held that since the defendant bar employed a security guard, who was on duty when the assault took place, defendant’s duty to protect had already been assumed and therefore the issue of foreseeability became irrelevant. The Court of Appeal in Delgado disagreed with Mata and held that “genuine foreseeability” of the “particular criminal conduct”-- in this case the assault on plaintiff -- was required in order to impose a legal duty of care on defendant. Accordingly, the Court of Appeal reversed the judgment for plaintiff on the ground that, even though there was evidence establishing that previous fights had occurred in the defendant’s parking lot, there was no indication of any prior “gang attacks” by a group of men in the parking lot.
Analysis
In a split decision, the Supreme Court majority noted that, although it was generally true that a defendant owes a duty of care to individuals who are foreseeably endangered by the defendant’s conduct with regard to risks that made the conduct unreasonably dangerous, it was also well established that no duty exists for a defendant to act to protect other individuals from the conduct of third parties. However, the majority reasoned that other decisions in the California Courts of Appeal have recognized the “special relationship” doctrine as an exception to the general “no duty to act rule.” That is, a defendant may owe an affirmative duty to protect another from the conduct of third parties if he or she has a “special relationship” with the other person. The majority found that the “special relationship” doctrine was dispositive and relied upon that doctrine to reverse the Court of Appeals and reinstate plaintiff’s judgment.
The majority concluded that a business proprietor’s special-relationship-based-duty includes an obligation to provide guards to protect its patrons only when there was a heightened foreseeability of third-party criminal activity on the premises of the business. This heightened foreseeability could be demonstrated by prior similar occurrences or other evidence of a reasonably foreseeable risk of criminal assaults in that location. Here, the majority found that defendant stood in a special relationship with plaintiff, its patron. Defendant therefore had a duty to take reasonable steps to protect plaintiff from foreseeable assaults by third parties. The majority found that even though plaintiff did not sufficiently demonstrate heightened foreseeability in the form of evidence of prior similar criminal assaults on defendant’s premises, defendant still owed other special relationship based duties to plaintiff, including, for example, a duty to respond to the altercation as it was unfolding.
Learning Point:
Restaurant and bar owners in California must be extremely vigilant with respect to averting altercations on their premises before they occur. The decision in Delgado expands their potential liability and makes it clear that even if there have been no previous criminal assaults or other such activity on their premises, the owners of the establishment can still be held liable for injuries to their patrons if it can be shown that they had actual notice of an impending assault. •
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