OK, so it has been a while. I have been really busy. Out of town too much, and not enough hours Monday through Friday. But this one burns me. It goes back to something I have discussed before, blame, fault, and the fact that someone else has to be to blame for everything.
Earlier this year, in Savannah, where I went to college, a young female college student was raped in the middle of the night, while walking through an empty parking lot. Now, this is a terrible thing, so don’t get me wrong here. I am not suggesting she is at fault. By no means. It was reported that she was allegedly, love that word; subject for later, raped by a vagrant. And from experience, there are a lot of those in Savannah, and they are hard to catch up to, since, well, they have no address. But this case went to court. Not to press charges against the vagrant, if and when they ever find him. But the case is being brought against the owner of the parking lot and the contractor using it as over flow parking for a jobsite during working hours. This parking lot looks just like every other parking lot in Savannah. And there are a lot of them. It is illuminated in accordance with the City of Savannah’s very strict lighting ordinances, and it is well maintained. She is suing the owner of the parking lot and the contractor for not properly securing the parking lot. Really. And how would you propose to do that. Build a really tall wall around it, so that if you are in there, and get accosted, NO ONE CAN SEE IN to help you. So that you can’t see anything going on in that lot. Not in Savannah, no way, you would have all sorts of vagrants, drug dealers and assorted other social deviants hiding out in there, away from the eyes of local law enforcement.
My problem is this, why on earth would you want to hold the owner of a parking lot responsible for something like this. Why? And why does someone think they can sue them for a large sum of money as a result. Since when does any wrong in a persons life automatically give them the right to find a lawyer, and make a ton of money from this. I know it will strike a chord, but I think it is really some lawyer trying to find a way to make a big paycheck for his firm. And that to me, is reprehensible, not as much as the original act of violence, but it is working on it, to drag good citizens, and businesses into such a case, make them spend their hard earned money to defend themselves as if they were the ones who personally committed the crime. This is what I call frivolous; there is no better way to describe it.
Sorry, this one bothered me, it hit home being that I spent a lot of time in Savannah, and I know the contractor being sued. It has bugged me for a few days now, just had to vent.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comments:
For the unfamiliar, I preface my retort with full disclosure - I am an attorney by trade.
Generally, under the law, an owner or user of property is responsible for actions arising out of that property. So, for example, if you slip and fall in the local Taco Bell, the land owner can be held liable. If the neighbor's kid drowns in your pool, you can be held liable. The fact that this parking lot is more public than private does not some how exempt the owner, or in this case, a person controlling the property, the contractor, from any liability for actions arising on the parking lot.
It is important to differentiate, however, the right to recover damages, and the right to sue to recover damages. A person is not required to prove that they are entitled to recover damages before they can actual bring suit. There would be no point of having a case if you know when it was filed that the other party was responsible. Oftentimes, the party filing suit may have an arguable claim, and filing a lawsuit in the first step in which one begins to investigate whether they are actually entitled to recover. Once the suit is filed the process of "discovery" can occur, wherein each party can request information from the other, and the other is obligated to respond. Imagine if Joe Citizen, after falling in the local Wal-Mart and sustaining significant injury, walked back into the store before filing a lawsuit and asked to see a record of whether standing water was reported and how long before the incident did it occur. I reckon Wal-Mart (on the advice of their counsel) would decline to provide any such information. But if you ask for that same information through the formal process of discovery, Wal-Mart is generally obligated to answer.
In a premises liability case - such as the Savannah parking lot case - the question is whether the harm was reasonably foreseeable and whether the land owner acted reasonably under the circumstances. I don't know the exact facts of this parking lot, but if it is, as you say, similar to every other parking lot in Savannah, the court will likely find that the land owner did act reasonably under the circumstances. But just because you and I think the land owner shouldn't be held liable doesn't mean that this woman, believing that the land owner in some way contributed to the events, should not have the right to pursue a claim.
In fact, if the woman was your wife or daughter (or my wife or daughter) and we thought it was (at least partly) the land owners fault, would you really want the case thrown out because some portion the general population thinks your claim is frivolous? I would answer 'no.' This is where the legal system works. Throughout the process of a lawsuit, there are numerous opportunities for the land owner to say effectively, 'it's not my fault' and for the court to agree - Motion to Dismiss, Motion for Summary Judgment, etc. And ultimately, if the case actually makes it to a trial (which is statistically unlikely, as approximately 95% of cases filed are either settled or dropped), the jury has the ultimate task of deciding whether the land owner should be held liable.
You see a frivolous lawsuit; I see the legal system working as it should.
Post a Comment