Summary Judgment Secured in a Dram Shop Liability Case

We won summary judgment in a challenging dram shop liability case against a large restaurant chain where the demand was $1 million. The plaintiff alleged our client was responsible for overserving the co-defendant driver prior to the subject motor vehicle accident. The court agreed with our arguments that the plaintiff failed to establish a violation of the The New Jersey Dram Shop Act. The plaintiff failed to present an expert report until opposing our motion for summary judgment. The expert report, which was submitted as an exhibit to the plaintiff’s opposition brief, did not extrapolate the defendant’s BAC at the time he left the defendant’s establishment. There was also no eyewitness testimony on the issue. The court rejected the plaintiff’s arguments that there was sufficient circumstantial evidence to support a jury’s conclusion that the co-defendant driver was visibly intoxicated at the time of service based on police observations at the scene of the accident and a (.17) BAC reading, which was administered approximately one hour and 30 minutes after leaving the restaurant. Distinguishing between prior case law and the subject circumstances, summary judgment was awarded based on the lack of either direct testimony or expert opinion as to the co-defendant’s state of intoxication at the time of service.