The family of a young man called from the hospital.  The man had been out with friends the night before, and was hit by a car while walking across a street.  He was in a coma, and expected to suffer permanent injuries, including brain damage.  The victim had only minimal insurance;  the driver of the car had only a $25,000 liability policy and no job.

Police reports showed that the driver of the car was drunk.  He had been drinking at several places, including a bar in Duluth and another bar or two in Wisconsin.  Minnesota law provides that a bar that sells alcoholic beverages to someone who is obviously intoxicated can be held liable for any damage that results from his or her intoxication.  However, Wisconsin law does not have such a law.

By the time he was released from the hospital and had complete therapy, my client had incurred medical bills of several hundred thousand dollars.  He would never be able to work again.  Doctors believed there was a good chance he would need to live in a nursing home for the rest of his life, if relative were unable to provide adequate care.

The criminal defense lawyer representing the drunk driver allowed us to talk to him.  He said he remembered drinking heavily at the Minnesota bar, and that he was probably acting intoxicated while there.  His friends from that night later testified that they did not think he was obviously intoxicated until later, when he was at the bar in Wisconsin.  We hired a private investigator who found some other witnesses who saw the driver drinking straight from a pitcher at the Duluth establishment.  We also retained an expert toxicologist who could estimate the man’s blood alcohol content at the time of being served in Duluth, based on his blood test after being arrested several hours later.

My client was a skilled auto mechanic whose goal was to run his own shop.  At the time of the accident, though, he was working at a relatively low wage job until he had the means to start a business.  We hired a vocational expert to project his loss of earning capacity based not on the actual job at the time of injury, but career he had planned on.  We also hired a nurse to estimate future medical and nursing home expenses.

We sued the Minnesota bar where the driver drank before crossing the bridge to Wisconsin that night, under Minnesota’s “dram shop” law.  At a pre-trial mediation we were able to reach a significant settlement with all parties, including the drunk driver, the bar, and the human services agencies that had paid most of the medical bills while the case was pending.  Part of the settlement was placed in trust to protect my client’s entitlement to future Medicare benefits and provide him with an income for life.