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Forum nameGeneral Discussion
Topic subjectI 'm no attorney, but I sell liability insurance for a living.
Topic URLhttp://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=4&topic_id=13194314&mesg_id=13195228
13195228, I 'm no attorney, but I sell liability insurance for a living.
Posted by lonesome_d, Mon Sep-18-17 01:05 PM
The failure to secure the freezer is obviously the big red flag.

The young lady was an invitee, even if she was not the registered guest, and was therefore entitled to assurances of safety from the facility, advice on potential hazards, and a duty to rescue in the event of an incident.
The hotel clearly failed on all three of those.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invitee

I can see a few factors that could work against her being considered an invitee (such as her wandering into the vacant area), but none that would be strong enough to counter the facts that they knew she was missing, failed to search the premises thoroughly for her when they knew she was missing, and ultimately found her much later frozen to death in an unsecured freezer on premises. The fact that she was inebriated could go either way - while it's tempting to say 'she got drunk and she shouldn't have,' from some perspectives, it would strengthen the hotel's obligations to keep her safe since she was clearly unable to recognize what was safe and unsafe on her own.


But even aside from all that - One of the things I've seen over and over again with big bodily injury claims is that it doesn't even usually matter if the premises operator was truly at fault - if an occurrence is horrific enough, somebody's gonna pay.