As I suspected the questions involving the ISU architecture student that died earlier this past month after visiting a night club centered on whether she was given drinks from the bar or by other bar patrons.  One question has been answered. There is one issue yet resolved. An Ames man, age unknown, has been charged with a misdemeanor involving providing alcohol to a minor.

Most people (non-lawyers) will think just buying her drinks, serving her as an underage adult and then she is later struck by a train should be sufficient to sue and win, but it isn’t. The reason why we can sue the bar is because the dram shop statute creates or does away with the issue of proximate cause. Under Iowa’s dram shop statute we need simply to prove the bar or tavern served the patron either while intoxicated or to the point of intoxication. If later they cause injury or death the necessary link is established. There is no dram shop statute for people who aren’t in the bar business making money from serving alcohol.

Consider the facts and think about causation. Someone is handed drinks to the point where they get drunk. Hours later, on an unknown road she makes a decision to cross railroad tracks, in the dead of night and without knowledge of the people in the bar. The underage drinker could have called a cab, or friends to pick her up. She could have chosen any of the hundreds of roads back to her dorm or apartment. She’s making all the choices out of a thousand she can choose. The courts say where is the foreseeability? You can’t prove what she chose to do after leaving the bar is foreseeable to the guy buying her drinks. In the eyes of the law her choices later that night are not foreseeable. So if the public wants a different result it will have to come from the Iowa legislature.  My guess is beyond a misdemeanor charge nothing will come of it unless there are bar patrons willing to come forward to implicate the bar’s employees with knowledge of what was going on earlier that night in the bar.

As a lawyer with 30-years under my belt many questions come to mind. They include:

1. If he pleads guilty can his admission to a misdemeanor be used as an admission against interest in a civil suit for wrongful death?
2. Can proof that he provided drinks to the young coed ever be a proximate cause when as a private citizen, making no money from serving alcohol to a minor is sued for the death that takes place hours later and by a train collision?
3. Will the person providing the alcohol have homeowner’s insurance that might cover any damages?
4. What will the young man say about whether the bartender knew what was going on that night?
5. Will the patrons implicate the bar with testimony they knew what was going on?
6. What was the blood alcohol content of the young lady that died and does it match with the amount of alcohol provided by the man charged?
7. Had the young woman drank anywhere else that night? If so where and with who?
8. Did the bar employees know this was going on and did nothing about it?
9. What witnesses can be identified that prove complicity on the part of the tavern?
10. What does the Ames Police Department investigation show?
11. Who is collecting the list of names of those who were with her that night?
12. Who is collecting the list of names of those in the bar that night?
13. Was anyone with her walking her home?

As a parent I have only one question, what the hell is wrong with you guys? Why would my daughter choose to hang around with guys willing to take advantage of her youth and inexperience and who would allow her to walk home without an escort. What the hell were you thinking? I'd hope she walked into every one of your dreams for a long time to come, waking you up in a cold sweat racked with guilt.

These are not easy cases to prove. They are tremendously difficult and pose considerable legal issues with proving proximate cause. Unless the bar employees can be shown to have knowledge patrons are buying and gifting drinks to underage patrons, it’s a tough sell to the Court against the tavern.

Ames man faces alcohol charge in death of Iowa State student, Des Moines Register and the AP, July 28, 2010

And last “The Iowa Deer Magnet”, Kacee Larson has hit a total of 5 deer in the past 12 months and she’s not even 18-years-old.  See Iowa girl is “deer magnet”, July 26, 2010 in the Des Moines Register.