We aren\u2019t big believers in the idea that accidents simply \u201chappen.\u201d To be sure, there are certainly instances that can be called \u201cacts of God.\u201d If a gust of wind blows a moving car over, you can\u2019t say that anyone is at fault there. Or if somebody gets struck by lightning out of the clear blue sky, there would be no conceivable way to lay the blame on anyone. Sometimes, things just happen.<\/p>\n
But as injury lawyers in Washington, D.C, it has been our experience that most accidents are \u201ccaused.\u201d Somebody makes a poor decision, or somebody neglects to perform an expected task, or somebody acts without thinking about the consequences, and the end result is that someone gets hurt or worse. You can\u2019t really call an instance of negligence <\/a>by a doctor \u201can accident.\u201d Nor can you call it \u201can accident\u201d when a driver hits a pedestrian in the crosswalk because he was texting while driving.<\/p>\n Another thing that isn\u2019t an accident is continuing to serve a patron alcohol after he has already had enough to be visibly intoxicated. \u00a0It\u2019s hard to make the argument that you didn\u2019t know that there would be potential harmful effects if you served a patron close to twenty drinks over the course of an evening and then didn\u2019t even bother to try to call him a cab.<\/p>\n In many states, there are laws in place that hold establishments that serve alcohol liable for any damage that might be caused if their patrons get drunk and behave irresponsibly. These are called Dram Shop Laws. There are limits to these laws, of course. For instance, if a man walks into a bar after drinking heavily elsewhere and only orders one drink, and that man shows no visible signs of being drunk, it could be argued that there was no way for the bartender to know what the customer had been doing before entering the establishment. Bartenders have many talents and capabilities, but telepathy is not one of them.<\/p>\n However, In the case of Michael Eaton, telepathy was not needed. \u00a0On August 21, 2008, Mr. Eaton came into Dogfish Head Alehouse in Gaithersburg at around 4 in the afternoon. \u00a0He opened a bar tab, and in the course of six hours he ordered 14 Coronas and 2 shots that are called \u201cLemon Drops.\u201d \u00a0Lemon Drops are essentially about an ounce and a half of vodka. \u00a0It could be argued that Mr. Eaton didn\u2019t drink all of the alcohol that he ordered. \u00a0But even if he bought half of those drinks for other people his tally up to that point would have been 8 drinks.<\/p>\n After closing that first bar tab, he opened another, this time purchasing 3 more Coronas and a shot of tequila. Then he paid that off and left.<\/p>\n At no point did anyone at the bar cut him off. \u00a0At no point did anyone say \u201cI think you\u2019ve had enough.\u201d It\u2019s a safe assumption that the only thing that was said to Mr. Eaton by the employees at Dogfish Ale House was \u201cWould you like another round?\u201d or \u201cHere\u2019s your check.\u201d They can\u2019t make the argument that they didn\u2019t know he was drunk. They were also responsible for getting him that way.<\/p>\n This is an important point. Because after Mr. Eaton left the bar, he got into his car and proceeded to drive down I-270 at around 90 miles an hour. \u00a0It was there that he slammed into a car carrying Jazimen Warr, a ten year old girl. Jazimen Warr did not survive the experience.<\/a><\/p>\n Mr. Eaton is now serving a term in prison for vehicular manslaughter, which is what he deserves. \u00a0But the underlying question is this: How much responsibility does Dogfish Head Alehouse have in the death of Ms. Warr? Mr. Eaton sat in that establishment for four hours and consumed enough alcohol to where there could have been no question as to his state. Establishments that sell alcohol should have a duty to do so in a responsible manner. So where does this leave Dogfish Head Ale House? Are they liable?<\/p>\n We believe they are. Unfortunately, Maryland believes that they are not.<\/p>\n Maryland is one of the few states in America that has no laws establishing liability for bar and restaurant owners for the actions of their customers, even if the amount of alcohol they consume is a direct cause for anything that happens later. \u00a0Considering what the Warr family lost, and considering how easy it would have been for the people at Dogfish Head Ale House to prevent what happened, we believe dram shop laws should be put into place. This is a position that we have held for quite some time<\/a>, and it is one of the reasons that we are representing the Warr family.<\/p>\n Greenberg and Bederman is a personal injury law firm <\/a>located in Silver Spring, Maryland. We are currently offering legal assistance to anyone in the Maryland, D.C. and Virginia areas who has been injured due to no fault of their own. If you or a loved one in the D.C. area has been injured due to a drunk driver,\u00a0contact Greenberg and Bederman for a free legal consultation <\/a>today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We aren\u2019t big believers in the idea that accidents simply \u201chappen.\u201d To be sure, there are certainly instances that can be called \u201cacts of God.\u201d If a gust of wind blows a moving car over, you can\u2019t say that anyone is at fault there. Or if somebody gets struck by lightning out of the clear […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dram-shop-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3104"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23384,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions\/23384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gblawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}