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View Full Version : Jury agrees: crashes of cars into stores are stores’ fault




Lucille
03-28-2016, 12:51 PM
I guess this means all stores will have to install bollards now?


For some time trial lawyers have been promoting the theory that when runaway cars smash into convenience stores and other retail locations, it is the stores’ fault for not installing protective bollards. This theory has now taken a big leap forward in a case in which a Western Massachusetts jury has told Cumberland Farms to pay $32 million over a crash in which a motorist who’d had a stroke careened off a road and into a Chicopee store.

http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2016/02/jury_awards_323_million_to_chi.html

http://www.fairwarning.org/2016/02/storefront-crash-suit-against-cumberland-farms-yields-32-4-million-verdict/

http://img.picturequotes.com/2/11/10733/a-jury-is-composed-of-twelve-men-of-average-ignorance-quote-1.jpg

Sonny Tufts
03-28-2016, 02:17 PM
From the second linked article:


The accident that took Kimmy Dubuque’s life was far from an isolated event. Cumberland Farms alone had 485 “car strikes’’ from 2000 through 2009 at its 500-plus East Coast convenience stores, according to records submitted in the Dubuque case.

timosman
03-28-2016, 02:26 PM
From the second linked article:

The accident that took Kimmy Dubuque’s life was far from an isolated event. Cumberland Farms alone had 485 “car strikes’’ from 2000 through 2009 at its 500-plus East Coast convenience stores, according to records submitted in the Dubuque case.


That's terrible - on average once every 10 years a store was stricken. /s

MelissaWV
03-28-2016, 02:44 PM
That's terrible - on average once every 10 years a store was stricken. /s

While I don't agree with the jury award, the company should be looking at whether that's much higher than average or not. If it is, there might be a reason (do the storefronts have large areas of glass too close to the road itself? are the materials they're using less likely to stop an impact? are they lobbying for corner lots at the cost of having a higher chance of a car crash involving their store?). I don't know about you, but my local store has not been hit once every ten years by a car.

Lucille
03-28-2016, 02:44 PM
From the second linked article:

I forgot this link!

http://overlawyered.com/2016/03/trial-lawyer-theory-crashes-of-cars-into-stores-are-store-owners-fault/


[Springfield Republican; more at Fair Warning, which as is its wont (http://overlawyered.com/2014/09/liability-roundup-2/) takes the plaintiff’s-bar side]

tod evans
03-28-2016, 02:57 PM
That's a novel theory.......

Stores are responsible for public safety....

Today it's to keep patrons safe from wayward automobiles, what'll it be tomorrow?

Wonder if there'll be new government agencies created to write safety mandates and enforce compliance or if existing agencies can be bolstered with more funding and a larger staff...

Sonny Tufts
03-28-2016, 04:49 PM
That's terrible - on average once every 10 years a store was stricken. /s

Another way to look at it is that on average each year 48.5 stores had crashes. That's 4 per month. If I'm running Cumberland Farms, this would get my attention.

oyarde
03-28-2016, 06:15 PM
Another way to look at it is that on average each year 48.5 stores had crashes. That's 4 per month. If I'm running Cumberland Farms, this would get my attention.

I am thinking it means I am selling a lotta stuff and now my ins co is gonna drop me after they pay out the millions .32 of 'em .

timosman
03-28-2016, 06:21 PM
I am thinking it means I am selling a lotta stuff and now my ins co is gonna drop me after they pay out the millions .32 of 'em .

We need to wait for an appeal before we know what the final amount is going to be. I am sure jury consultants will be used this time.

Lucille
03-28-2016, 07:28 PM
The Planners are Planning as we speak.

http://www.fairwarning.org/2014/09/storefront-crashes-story-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx/


Many safety experts say that for a modest cost — often $10,000 or less — barriers can be installed that give customers, employees and pedestrians substantial protection from vehicles that otherwise might jump a curb and careen into a store. In fact, barriers known as bollards, posts typically made of steel and often filled with concrete, already are a familiar sight beside vulnerable sections of shopping centers and government buildings. Still, safety specialists and plaintiffs lawyers say some big chains and other businesses, as well as shopping center owners, have done too little to reduce the risks.
[...]
However, the U.S. Postal Service, another one of the nation’s most-struck organizations, said through a spokesman that it has considered, and decided against, routinely installing bollards at its 30,000 branches around the country. The spokesman, Mark Saunders, said concerns including costs and access for people with disabilities “preclude the USPS from making changes to our existing design standards.” He said during the three years from fiscal 2011 through fiscal 2013, the number of crashes annually at post office branches declined, but there still were 592, leading to $1 million in repair costs.

End Nose-In Parking?

The Postal Service isn’t alone in its reluctance to embrace safety barriers. Some transportation and safety analysts point to other possible solutions. “The answer might be changing the design of cars, to make it more difficult for a foot to slip off the pedal,” said Todd Litman, a transportation consultant in Victoria, B.C.

While bollard proponents also support eliminating nose-in parking, they argue that barriers are crucial. These advocates, led by Texas A&M’s Alberson and Reiter of the Storefront Safety Council, have labored the last several years to develop industry standards for low-speed vehicle barriers. They are working through the standards-setting group ASTM International, formerly known as the American Society for Testing and Materials. They said they expect final adoption of a voluntary industry standard in 2015, a development they hope will lead to broader use of safety barriers.
[...]
Fleming is now working with Manalo to promote the Artesia bollard ordinance, and he is thinking of pushing the issue at the state, and even the federal, level at some point.

“It’s not going to be popular with businesses – everyone hates regulations. There should be some sort of tax credits incentive to do it, but it needs to be done,”Fleming said. “If not, this is going to happen again and again and again.”

TheTexan
03-28-2016, 07:44 PM
Any company making bollards I can invest in?

angelatc
03-28-2016, 08:30 PM
The answer might be changing the design of cars, to make it more difficult for a foot to slip off the pedal,”

Yeah, so when I have a heart attack my foot stays right on that gas pedal.

heavenlyboy34
03-28-2016, 08:47 PM
That's a novel theory.......

Stores are responsible for public safety....

Today it's to keep patrons safe from wayward automobiles, what'll it be tomorrow?

Wonder if there'll be new government agencies created to write safety mandates and enforce compliance or if existing agencies can be bolstered with more funding and a larger staff...

I'm kind of surpised the insurance companies didn't think of it already! :eek: Expect them to lobby for mandatory storefront protection or else...

oyarde
03-28-2016, 08:57 PM
Now everything will just cost more as the cost of these will be added to purchase price of goods as Ins co.'s require it for the cheapest rate . Great news amerika .

presence
03-28-2016, 08:59 PM
wait wut?

dipshits can't drive therefore I'm responsible for dipshits smashing my storefront?

Legal FUBAR

NorthCarolinaLiberty
03-29-2016, 12:51 AM
What in the world is a "car strike?" I looked at the document that cites about one "strike" per week in many cases. This article is trying to say that a car does this once a week? It was not even an official document with definitions or explanations. Just mostly dates and some numbers.

No, I am not buying that, especially with all this money involved. Unless they mean that people are pulling out of small parking spaces and hitting a walking person or a garbage can. Even then, I am not buying it.

heavenlyboy34
03-29-2016, 01:08 AM
wait wut?

dipshits can't drive therefore I'm responsible for dipshits smashing my storefront?

Legal FUBAR

Ain't 'Murica grand? And teh Trump is gonna make it even GREATER.

RonPaulIsGreat
03-29-2016, 09:56 AM
I'd sue the store if they put up concrete barriers and I crashed into them as opposed to the store.

The store would act as a less rigid braking device for my vehicle which would allow more time for my body to slow, and reduce the chance I'd be seriously injured or die!!!

The store should have known this before they installed deadly quick stop devices they KNEW would result in a much higher chance of driver injury. Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury quik-mart in essence installed death rods in front of their store, with no regard for all human life. The death rods cause an immediate stop, slamming the brain and internal organs forward in a horrifying and sadistic fashion, one could not create a device more likely to Kill! There are alternatives, building thicker store walls that will stop a vehicle but allow a precious extra couple of feet to slow the car far more safely, as opposed to the death trap they installed! No, quick mart is liable, at best they are negligent, at worst they've shown a blatant disregard for life. The nominal cost per quik-mart is a mere 75K, is your life worth 75K, is grandmas life worth 75K is your childs life. Quik-Mart doesn't think so. Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury the court puts it to you, is your childs life worth 75K??? I think the verdict should be clear. This madness must end!!! Stop the death, Stop Quik-Mart!

Brian4Liberty
03-29-2016, 10:17 AM
Cumberland Farms purchased the location in 1974, and never had an accident that damaged the store, Campbell said.


There had never been an accident at that location.

Ronin Truth
03-29-2016, 11:14 AM
Bad stores, bad, bad, stores, for shame. No desert tonight and a time-out for you. GRRRRR! :mad:

Mach
03-29-2016, 01:10 PM
Store owners, and their lawyers, need to get together and start consolidating some plane crash data.

Sometimes, shit happens, when you start trying to control all of the piles of shit, it just creates more.

Anti Federalist
03-29-2016, 01:32 PM
The self driving cars will solve this problem.

Ronin Truth
03-29-2016, 01:40 PM
The self driving cars will solve this problem.

AHA! :D

Brian4Liberty
03-29-2016, 01:59 PM
With convenience stores from Maine to Florida, Cumberland Farms had the corporate assets to spend on safety precautions, Egan said.

Lawyers going after the deep pockets. Jurors obliged because it's redistribution of wealth.