“…The complaint seeks compensatory, punitive and other damages from the Hotel St. Francis and Heritage Hotels and Resorts of Albuquerque, which has managed the hotel since 2008. It says the defendants violated the state Liquor Control Act and other laws by over-serving alcohol to Sherman…”
A California man says in a lawsuit that he is a paraplegic because he was over-served alcohol at the Hotel St. Francis’ bar two years ago, fell down and damaged his spine. Mike Sherman of Petaluma, Calif., accuses the hotel staff of destroying videos that might show how he ended up with a vertebral fracture at the downtown hotel.
According to a complaint filed April 1 in state District Court, Sherman checked into the St. Francis on April 26, 2010, then went to its Secreto Bar and ran up three tabs totaling $177.97.
By 8 p.m., bar manager Daniel Gonzales determined Sherman was intoxicated, served him one more cocktail and told bar employees that would be his last, yet he was served other drinks later, the complaint says.
By 10 p.m., it says, Gonzales walked Sherman to his room, but later that evening, or early the next day, security guard James Cox found Sherman unconscious and lying on the floor outside two other hotel rooms. Sherman was taken to Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center for emergency treatment of his spinal injury, then transferred back to California for further treatment.
The complaint by lawyers Esteban Aguilar of Albuquerque and Michael Kelly of San Francisco says a lawyer working for Sherman’s partner, Scott Clark, called Steve Caalim, who was then the hotel’s general manager, to ask that he preserve videos or other records relating to the incident.
But Sherman was told that none of the hotel’s several security cameras were working that night, the complaint says, accusing the hotel of having the videos “intentionally destroyed, erased, deleted or otherwise tampered with … to hide, conceal or destroy evidence.”
For more:Â http://www.santafenewmexican.com/Local%20News/Man-sues-hotel-over-spinal-injury
