Today courts consider bars’ liability in drinking and driving deaths

Via RoadTrafficSigns.com

The slippery slope that leads to the often tragic and sometimes fatal decision to drink and drive is just that: slippery. How do bartenders know when one round is a drink too many? Monitoring a customer’s behavior is often pragmatically difficult — a bartender is usually busy juggling orders, cleaning, or, well, making drinks — and there’s little financial incentive to do so. Moreover, the risk of offending a patron and losing their business permanently presents a delicate difficulty.

However, the devastating cost of fatalities caused by drinking and driving, particularly the death of ten-year-old Jazimen Warr in Maryland, may put the onus on bars and restaurants to put a stop to the drunken driving of their patrons before it starts. Jazimen’s family is suing Dogfish Head Alehouse for over three million dollars, alleging that the driver who struck and killed Jazimen in 2008 was irresponsibly over-served alcohol (nearly 20 drinks) by the establishment. This watershed suit will be heard in Maryland’s high court today.

From The Baltimore Sun:

Michael D. Eaton ran up a tab for 17 beers plus other drinks before he left a Gaithersburg tavern, according to court records. Forty-five minutes later, behind the wheel of his Range Rover, he slammed into the back of a Jeep Cherokee at a speed estimated as high as 98 mph.

Ten-year-old Jazimen Warr had nestled on her sister’s shoulder, the two children sleeping in the back of the family’s Cherokee on the drive to a relative’s home in Bowie. She was killed and the rest of her family sustained injuries in the crash.

That was Aug. 21, 2008.

Now, that crash on Interstate 270 could upend Maryland law and allow victims of drunken-driving crashes and their families to sue bars and restaurants if their inebriated patrons cause deaths and injuries.

Jazimen’s grandparents are scheduled to ask Maryland’s highest court Tuesday to revive their $3.25 million lawsuit against the Dogfish Head Alehouse, where they allege Eaton, of Fairfax, Va., ran up his tab, some of which may have included drinks for other patrons.

“If you’re going to load up somebody with liquor, at least be responsible so they don’t get behind the wheel,” said the Rev. William Warr of Urbana , the child’s disabled grandfather who, with his wife, Angela, were raising Jazimen and her sister Cortavia Harris. Cortavia suffered a broken hip in the wreck.

Dogfish Head Alehouse has fought back, urging the Court of Appeals to reject the Warrs’ claim. An attorney representing the corporation that owns the tavern declined to comment on the pending case.

Bar and restaurant owners are among those watching the case closely.