The family said that it repeated asked the casino to stop serving Glenn because he was on medication. Yet they said that casino workers kept serving him free drinks in August 2009.
Glenn was on Percocet and morphine as well as antipsychotic medications.
The proximate causation and defense issues in the case would seem to present significant barriers for the family. Glenn reportedly attempted suicide days before his death. He had suffered a traumatic brain injury in a four-wheeler accident in 2004 and was injured in his back in a 2007 car accident. He had collected $15,000 on an earlier lawsuit and had moved to Virginia with his mother and brother after he lost everything in Hurricane Katrina.
The family is seeking $75 million.
The case raises a classic over-serving claim where the family is saying that casino employees were informed that Glenn had consumed too much alcohol. Casinos cannot claim that a customer has the final word on how much they can consume. Casinos routinely cut off people under dram shop rules. It becomes a bit more difficult if the person is not exhibiting signs of being over-served and is demanding more alcohol.
The case does expose another all-too-common example of the social costs of casinos, which tend to make their money on lower income players as opposed to high rollers. Here was a man with little money â and apparently little luck in life â being encouraged to keep playing with a steady stream of alcohol. It is a tragedy played out across the country in greater numbers as cities turn to casinos for an infusion of money at a time of budget restraints.
Source: USA Today