[StBernard] Grocery stores found negligent for selling alcohol to teens involved in fatal car crash

[Westley Annis]

Grocery stores found negligent for selling alcohol to teens involved in
fatal car crash

Published: Friday, August 05, 2011, 10:10 PM

 By Paul Purpura, The Times-Picayune 

A Jefferson Parish jury on Friday found two grocery stores negligent for
their roles in a fatal car crash in northern St. Tammany Parish six years
ago, bringing to almost $21 million the amount awarded to parents of three
Chalmette teens who died and one who suffered massive injuries in the
horrific accident days before Hurricane Katrina.

Because of pretrial settlements between those families and defendants, the
jury's actual award to be paid by Winn-Dixie and the Meraux Food Store in
Chalmette totals about $6.7 million.

Ending a two-week trial in which some defendants claimed evidence was lost
to Katrina flooding, the jury deliberated about three hours in finding that
four businesses and 17-year-old Brian LaFontaine were negligent in causing
the Aug. 21, 2005, crash in which LaFontaine, a head-strong high school
wrestler, was too drunk to drive but refused to turn over his keys to his
friends and sped away with four teenage passengers.

"We needed to stop him. He shouldn't be driving," LaFontaine's friend,
Christopher Acosta, recounted in testimony last week in which he described
driving after his friend and finding the carnage of twisted bodies -- his
friends dead, badly injured or in their final moments of life.

Driving about 10 mph over the 55 mph speed limit on Louisiana 16 near Sun,
LaFontaine lost control of his car and crashed into a tree about five miles
from the Bogue Chitto River Canoeing and Tubing Center, where he and scores
of St. Bernard Parish teens had gone that Sunday to mark what Acosta said
was a trip "to celebrate our senior year."

LaFontaine died, as did Charie Billiot and Rachel Gabb, both 16. Billiot's
sister, Chrissie Billiot, the only passenger wearing a seat belt, survived.

Ryan Wiltz, then 16, also survived but suffered permanent brain damage and
will require medical care for the rest of his life. He caught a ride back to
St. Bernard Parish with LaFontaine only to be with Charie Billiot, on whom
he had a crush, according to testimony.

Floating down the Bogue Chitto with them that day were ice chests filled
with beer and bottles of liquor, most of it purchased by minors in St.
Bernard Parish stores and some of it consumed by LaFontaine, whose blood
alcohol content level at autopsy was two-and-a-half times the legal limit,
attorneys said.

The wreck triggered three lawsuits in 2006, filed in Jefferson Parish
because several of the defendants had offices there, attorneys said. The
cases were consolidated in Judge Steve Windhorst's court. Three defendants
settled, leaving only Winn-Dixie and Meraux Food Store defending themselves
in the trial.

"We can't eliminate the problem," attorney Richard Trahant of Metairie, who
represented Wiltz's family, told the jury Friday in urging them to punish
the stores. "But we can sure try to make it better."

Damages awarded

Wiltz's parents, Tim and Gina Wiltz, filed suit seeking an array of damages,
most of it tied to the medical care their son requires. Trahant, working the
case with Scott Labarre, asked the jury to award the Wiltzes $42.3 million.
But the jury awarded the family $18.6 million, of which $15 million is for
his future medical care.

Gabb's parents, Glenn and Cynthia Gabb, were awarded $2 million for the
wrongful death of their daughter, plus $18,700 for her funeral expenses.
Their attorney, Michael Ginart, asked the jury Friday for $2 million.

"Say it out loud," Ginart told the jury. "We're not going to tolerate
selling alcohol to minors."

Tina Tommaseo was awarded $300,000 for the deaths of her children,
LaFontaine and Charie Billiot, who were half-siblings.

'Community of alcohol'

Not all the victims had been drinking, attorneys said. Apparently unable to
link the beer LaFontaine drank to specific stores, the plaintiffs' attorneys
pursued the case following a "community of alcohol" theory, because
witnesses claimed teens pooled their beer in ice chests and LaFontaine was
randomly getting beers from those chests.

The largest of the plaintiffs is the Winn-Dixie chain, whose store on Paris
Road was accused of selling cases of beer to teens on the morning of the
tubing trip and whose parking lot served as the mustering point. As many as
50 people had met there, packed ice chests and began drinking alcohol before
the trek to northern St. Tammany, attorneys said.

Jurors found the grocery did not sell alcohol to minors but is negligent for
allowing the minors to possess and drink alcohol on their premises.

Assigning blame

The jury assigned 10 percent of the liability for the deaths and injuries to
Winn-Dixie; of the $21 million awarded to the families, the grocery chain
would have to pay less than $2.1 million.

Winn-Dixie's attorneys, Robert Kerrigan and John Jerry Glas argued there was
no evidence that the store sold alcohol to minors. They lay most of the
blame on LaFontaine, who Kerrigan said was guilty of vehicular homicide.
Kerrigan also said blame rests with the Alex Chevron store in St. Bernard
Parish and the Bogue Chitto tubing business, whose employees knew the minors
were drinking beer and even coached them on avoiding police roadblocks.

"Hold fast to your judgment," Kerrigan told jurors. "Don't be swayed by
sympathy."

The tubing business, the Alex Chevron store and LaFontaine's father's
insurance company all settled. Brother's Food Mart also was named in the
original lawsuits, helping bring the cases to Jefferson Parish, but that
business was let out of the cases in 2009 because there was no evidence it
sold beer that LaFontaine drank.

The jury found Meraux Food Store did sell to minors beer that LaFontaine
drank and should shoulder 22.5 percent of the liability, amounting to about
$4.6 million. The store's attorney Stephen Elliott attacked the plaintiffs'
"community of alcohol" theory because the opposing attorneys could not prove
where the alcohol LaFontaine drank was purchased. As such, Elliott argued,
the plaintiffs "hit everyone."

"The community of alcohol theory does not pass muster," Elliott said.

Paul Purpura can be reached at ppurpura at timespicayune.com or 504.826.3791.