Key West Injury Lawyer Blog
A U.S. airman stopped a Fort Walton Beach hotel robbery by making a simple call Friday, according to police.
The incident happened just before 10 a.m. Friday at a Residence Inn when the airman was walking through the lobby and noticed a “suspicious interaction” between the clerk and a person at the front desk. Luckily for the clerk, he called police as he left the lobby.
Police announced in a Dec. 30 news release that the man at the front desk had “brandished what appeared to be a concealed weapon in his jacket and demanded money.”
The man was charged with armed robbery, according to reporting from the Miami Herald.
Leesfield & Partners
With offices throughout Florida in Key West, Miami and Orlando, Leesfield & Partners attorneys have become experts in a number of personal injury practice areas, including negligent or inadequate security. To date, the firm has secured over $93 million in inadequate and negligent security cases. These cases have involved vicious assaults, rapes, robberies and other attacks at hotels, malls, gas stations and residential properties.
Through the years, attorneys at the firm have developed cutting-edge trial techniques in negligent security litigations, making it among the national leading edge of personal injury law firms that handle these types of cases. The firm has obtained various multi-million-dollar recoveries for clients injured by the criminal acts of a third party and for the grieving families left behind by such acts. One such example of Leesfield & Partners’ tenacity can be seen in a landmark case against a popular grocery store chain.
In that case, our client was a worker attempting to fix a sprinkler system at a strip mall when he saw a man trying to rob an 89-year-old woman. Our client chased the thief, who had a car waiting for him when our client pounded on the glass and demanded the return of the woman’s purse. He was shot through the window in the chest.
He lived but was left with scarring and vascular damage to his arm. Because the strip mall did not have adequate security who could have intervened to help the elderly woman, our client was severely and permanently injured and left scarred from a terrifying ordeal. The case was settled for $125,000 against the landlord and a verdict of over $1.5 million was returned against the grocery store.
Negligent Security
Property owners in negligent security cases have no duty to protect against harm caused by the criminal acts of a third party but can be held liable for damages if criminal acts are foreseeable. For example, if a hotel is known to have regular occurrences of gun violence but does not hire armed security guards or install surveillance cameras that help to deter such incidents from occurring, then that hotel could be seen as negligent in their duty to protect guests, employees and other invitees to the property.
This was the case in a sickening ordeal experienced by a husband and wife at a Miami hotel in which they were viciously attacked. The attacker was able to enter the lobby and go up the elevator to the couple’s floor, all without being questioned by hotel staff despite not being a guest. No locks or other preventative measures were in place that would have restricted the man’s access to the hotel.
Instead, he was able to knock on the couple’s door where he began his violent attack on the husband before turning his ire on the wife who he beat, sexually assaulted and raped in the hallway and elevator. Employees and the hotel’s security guard witnessed the attack but did nothing to intervene.
It was discovered in an investigation that the hotel had a history of violence including armed robberies, assaults, rapes and other incidences of gun violence. Despite the advice from a security company and police who were frequently called out to the property, hotel officials did not hire armed security to patrol the premises.
A $16 million recovery was obtained for the couple in that case.
“It’s a case that should remind businesses why it’s crucial to provide security measures that are relative to the premises and its surrounding area,” said Partner and Trial Lawyer, Justin B. Shapiro, who handled the case.
Previous Cases
In another hotel case, this time out of Key West, the hotel failed to ensure that its parking garage was locked. This negligence allowed for a crazed man with a hammer to enter the parking garage and roam around, undetected, for over 20 minutes before he encountered our client. The man attacked her with the hammer and caused severe, painful and permanent injuries to her face and head.
A confidential settlement was reached with the hotel the night before a $40.58 verdict was handed down against the remaining defendant.
In an ongoing cruise ship case involving the installation of hidden cameras by a crew member to film unsuspecting guests in their private stateroom bathrooms, our client was left feeling violated and traumatized.
The crew member in that case was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for his crime.
That case is being handled by Bernardo Pimentel II, a Trial lawyer at the firm.
The firm previously secured a $1 million recovery for a Key West hotel housekeeper who was raped while on the job.
For a client who was attempting to use an unguarded ATM and was shot, the firm obtained a $3 million settlement. The client in that case was left with paraplegic injuries as a result of the shooting.
Over $1 million was secured for a shop employee at a mall who was raped and robbed during the day, a time when the mall decided to reduce security on the property.
A foreign college student incurred neurological injuries and paralysis as a result of a vicious attack at his dormitory.
Leesfield & Partners obtained $3.2 million for the student in that case for the failure to warn about the dangerous neighborhood.
