In a recent case, a plaintiff filed suit against a drunken driver who ran a red light and rendered him quadriplegic. The driver filed a cross-complaint alleging that Slaughter, Reagan & Cole, LLP’s client, a Downtown Ventura hotel, was partly responsible for plaintiff’s damages because the drunken driver was ejected from the hotel for repeatedly disrupting the other guests. After successfully filing a motion to dismiss the case at the outset (a demurrer), the matter proceeded to trial resulting in the largest jury verdict in Ventura County history. The plaintiff was awarded $60,000,000.00 in actual damages and $65,000,000.00 in punitive damages.
The driver appealed the trial court’s decision dismissing the cross-complaint against our client. The matter was argued in the Court of Appeal. In a non-published decision, the appellate panel unanimously decided to sustain the ruling the trial court made that Slaughter, Reagan & Cole, LLP was successful in extricating its client from this claim.