Saturday, March 22, 2008

Good Luck with That

This article in the Press-Citizen:
An Arlington woman who was severely injured after riding with a drunk driver is suing the driver, the Riverside Casino & Golf Resort and the four downtown Iowa City bars that served him.

According to the lawsuit, filed March 17, on Nov. 18, 2006, Aaron Brewington, of Cedar Rapids, traveled to the Riverside Casino. The lawsuit alleges servers at the tavern inside the casino served Brewington to the point where he became drunk.

According to the lawsuit, Brewington then went to Iowa City, where he continued drinking at four downtown bars, including Brother's Bar & Grill, One-Eyed Jakes, The Union Bar and Third Base. The lawsuit alleges that at each of these bars, employees served Brewington to the point where they should have known he was drunk.

At some point in the evening, Alicia Seedorff was a passenger in Brewington's vehicle when he was driving in the early hours of Nov. 19, 2006. According to the lawsuit, Brewington was on Interstate 380 near the 2 mile marker when he lost control of his vehicle, left the road, rolled, crashed and ejected Seedorff from the vehicle.

Assumption of the risk, anyone? If nothing else, a comparative negligence reduction?

That said, she will likely argue she was drunk herself and so not in a position to know that Brewington was drunk despite apparently socializing with him that evening. All in all, however, I think the comments below the article show about how well that will be received by an Iowa jury. If I recall, I had a file that was similar while I was in-house and the plaintiff didn't fare well there, either. If it will fly anywhere in Iowa, it would be Johnson County, which is sort of a liberal enclave. But good luck with that.

No comments: