Kent Gravelle

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Practice Areas

• Family Law

• Criminal Defense

• Immigration

• Asbestos

• Employment Law

Professionals

• Joyce L. Cundy

• Kent Gravelle

• Vincent P. Martin

• Cynthia Miller

• Jamie Vicha

• Kathleen Hauser

About C&M

1125 Wells Fargo Plaza
7900 Xerxes Avenue S.
Bloomington, MN 55431
Phone: 952-746-4111
Fax: 952-746-4112

Dram Shop Defense

By Kent B. Gravelle, Esq.

A dram shop case typically occurs when a drunk patron of a restaurant or bar leaves in a motor vehicle and then injures or kills another driver or pedestrian.  The attorney for the plaintiff (the injured party) then brings a suit against the drunk driver and the bar or restaurant, seeking to recover personal injury damages.  Dram shop suits are allowed by Minnesota Statute Section 340A.801.

However, the bar or restaurant should only be liable if it served alcohol to “an obviously intoxicated person” pursuant to Minnesota Statute Section 340A.502.  Thus, just because a drunk driver had a high blood alcohol content does not necessarily mean that the driver was “an obviously intoxicated person” at the bar or restaurant, particularly if the drunk driver was an experienced drinker who could hold his alcohol well.

This is especially helpful to restaurants or bars who have recording security cameras.  If a patron is clearly not behaving in an intoxicated manner, then the judge is much more likely to throw the dram shop suit out of court once the attorney for the bar or restaurant files a motion for summary judgment with the security video attached as an exhibit.  Thus, even for restaurants or bars who do not have security problems, it may be in their best interest to install recording security cameras to be used in any future dram shop litigation.

Of course, if a bar or restaurant routinely serves alcohol to an obviously intoxicated person, a recording security camera system would actually assist the plaintiff’s case and could provide evidence for a motion for punitive damages.  Thus, bar and restaurant owners should train their waiters and bar tenders to watch for the signs of intoxication and not to continually serve mixed drinks to the same individual in one evening (not to imply that beer and wine cannot also lead to successful dram shop suits).

Bar and restaurant owners should also do their best to permanently record which drinks were sold to which patrons.  If records show that a bar or restaurant only sold one or two beers to a drunk driver, then the chances of getting out on summary judgment are made greater, particularly if the drunk driver patronized other bars prior to the accident. 

Finally, it should be remembered that even if the patron came to the bar or restaurant on foot and is expected to leave on foot, the patron should still not be served alcohol if he or she is obviously intoxicated.  For instance, recently in Scott County, a bar patron left an establishment on foot, went home to sleep, woke up the next morning and killed a pedestrian on the way to work.  The bar patron was still drunk from the night before and was imprisoned for manslaughter.  The pedestrian’s family brought a dram shop action against the bar and the Scott County judge refused to grant the bar’s motion for summary judgment.  Furthermore, bars are routinely sued for bar fights which were allegedly caused by obviously intoxicated patrons.  Facts such as these require that restaurants and bars remain vigilant with regard to the amount of alcohol served, even if the patron is expected to leave the restaurant on foot or in a taxi.