Bars, taverns, hotels, resorts, restaurants, fraternities, clubs, convention centers and virtually any type of establishment that is licensed to serve alcohol all have one thing in common—high-exposure for liquor liability. The stakes are high for the owners and operators of these establishments as they commonly face legal complaints based on laws known as Dram Shop statutes.
Marshall Dennehey has extensive experience representing members of the hospitality and liquor industry in dram shop litigation. Our clients include major restaurant chains, privately owned inns and taverns, hotel properties and a wide variety of entertainment venues. The attorneys in our practice group have successfully defended bars, taverns, hotels and a host of social organizations against claims from third parties arising from the alleged sale of alcohol to intoxicated patrons or to minors. We concentrate on the representation of liquor licensees and social hosts in cases ranging from simple injuries resulting from slip-and-falls to more significant complex personal injury and wrongful death claims.
With 40 years of experience in this practice area, we have worked with our clients to develop investigatory procedures, defense and discovery strategies, and trial preparation techniques that enable us to successfully defend such matters or settle them for reasonable sums. Our attorneys also possess the specific knowledge of the law and are intimately familiar with the unique dram shop statutes for every state in which we practice.
This hybrid area of law incorporates multiple liability exposures including:
- Dram Shop/Liquor Liability
- Amusement Sports & Recreation
- Hotel and Resort Law
- Hotel Security/Negligence
- Restaurant and Retail Liability
- Slip and Fall/General Liability
- Water Park Safety
We are cognizant that hospitality and liquor cases often have a public relations aspect, and we are fully prepared to manage all collateral issues that may arise. Additionally, our multi-office coverage and familiarity with local rules and practice provide us an edge in defending this litigation.
Results
Claims Against Bar/Restaurant Dismissed in Dram Shop Action
The plaintiff spent the afternoon at our client’s restaurant/bar before driving ten minutes to his local Country Club to continue celebrating his birthday. Ninety minutes after he arrived at the Club, he fell down the stairs and suffered a severe brain injury. His Blood Alcohol Content was roughly three times the legal limit. The plaintiff had previously worked as a high-end custom wood finisher but is now unable to see color, among having other deficits, and he is alleged to be fully disabled. After more than 20 depositions, and despite varying reports as to what the plaintiff had to drink at our client’s establishment, we were able to argue that he showed no signs of visible intoxication prior to the last service of alcohol by our client. Our motion was strenuously opposed by the Country Club, who argued there was testimony that the plaintiff appeared intoxicated upon his arrival at the Club. The court agreed with our argument that this was insufficient evidence for a jury to find that our client served alcohol to a visibly intoxicated plaintiff, and, as such, all claims against our client were dismissed and summary judgment was granted.
Summary Judgment Secured in a Dram Shop Liability Case
We won summary judgment in a challenging dram shop liability case against a large restaurant chain where the demand was $1 million. The plaintiff alleged our client was responsible for overserving the co-defendant driver prior to the subject motor vehicle accident. The court agreed with our arguments that the plaintiff failed to establish a violation of the The New Jersey Dram Shop Act. The plaintiff failed to present an expert report until opposing our motion for summary judgment. The expert report, which was submitted as an exhibit to the plaintiff’s opposition brief, did not extrapolate the defendant’s BAC at the time he left the defendant’s establishment. There was also no eyewitness testimony on the issue. The court rejected the plaintiff’s arguments that there was sufficient circumstantial evidence to support a jury’s conclusion that the co-defendant driver was visibly intoxicated at the time of service based on police observations at the scene of the accident and a (.17) BAC reading, which was administered approximately one hour and 30 minutes after leaving the restaurant. Distinguishing between prior case law and the subject circumstances, summary judgment was awarded based on the lack of either direct testimony or expert opinion as to the co-defendant’s state of intoxication at the time of service.
Thought Leadership
Case Law Alerts
Delaware Superior Court Holds No Coverage for Opioid Litigation Under CGL Policies Despite Choice-of-Law Challenge
November 3, 2026
The Delaware Superior Court in In re Albertsons Opioid Insurance Litigation reaffirmed and expanded Delaware’s growing body of opioid insurance coverage jurisprudence, holding that commercial general liability had no duty to defend or indemnify Albertsons in more than 100 opioid-related governmental lawsuits. The Court rejected Albertsons' attempt to avoid the Delaware Supreme Court's decisions in ACE American Insurance Co. v. Rite Aid Corp. and In re CVS Opioid Insurance Litigation through a choice-of-law argument, finding no meaningful conflict between Delaware, California, and Idaho law. The decision further solidifies Delaware as a jurisdiction that narrowly construes coverage for governmental opioid claims seeking recovery of public expenditures and economic losses. Albertsons operates retail pharmacies throughout the United States and, like many pharmacy chains, has been named in numerous lawsuits arising from the opioid epidemic. Governmental entities, including states, counties, municipalities, and tribes, sought recovery for costs allegedly incurred as a result of opioid addiction, treatment, law enforcement efforts, public health programs, and other opioid-related expenditures. Albertsons tendered more than 100 underlying opioid lawsuits to its commercial general liability insurers and sought defense and indemnity coverage under more than 100 policies spanning multiple policy periods. The insurers filed declaratory judgment actions in Delaware seeking rulings that no coverage existed. Albertsons acknowledged that recent Delaware Supreme Court decisions in Rite Aid and CVS presented significant obstacles to coverage. Rather than attempting to distinguish those cases on the underlying allegations, Albertsons argued that California or Idaho law should apply because those states purportedly interpreted "damages because of bodily injury" more broadly than Delaware. The Court granted summary judgment to the insurers and denied Albertsons’ motion for partial summary judgment, first holding that there was no actual conflict between Delaware law and the laws of California or Idaho. Under Delaware's choice-of-law framework, the court need not conduct a full "most significant relationship" analysis unless competing states' laws would produce different outcomes. Here, the court found that California, Idaho, and Delaware all apply materially similar insurance-coverage principles, including: giving policy language its plain meaning; construing ambiguities in favor of the insured; interpreting coverage broadly and exclusions narrowly; and recognizing the broad nature of the duty to defend. Having determined Delaware law applied, the court found the case straightforward. The Court emphasized that Rite Aid and CVS establish that coverage for damages "because of bodily injury" requires a direct connection between the claimed damages and specific bodily injuries. Following Rite Aid and CVS, the Court held these damages were too attenuated from any specific bodily injury to trigger coverage. Consistent with CVS, the Court held that where the nature of the claims asserted falls entirely outside policy coverage, courts may determine both defense and indemnity obligations as a matter of law. Because the underlying lawsuits sought only uncovered economic losses, no duty to indemnify existed. Albertsons signals that Delaware courts are unlikely to entertain efforts by pharmacy defendants to relitigate issues already settled by Rite Aid and CVS. Unless an underlying opioid complaint seeks damages tied to specific identifiable bodily injuries or property damage, insurers will have strong grounds to deny coverage under standard commercial general liability forms.
Case Law Alerts
Dead End for Plaintiff: No Duty, No Vicarious Liability, No Causation in Ohio Premises Liability Ruling
November 3, 2026
Carol Quinlan-Hall was injured when the headstone marking her father's grave fell on her while she and her husband were visiting the gravesite at Sts. Peter and Paul Cemetery Association ("SPPCA"). She sued SPPCA and Carl Slusher, the cemetery's sexton, alleging he had negligently repaired a tilt in the headstone years earlier and that this repair was the cause of the eventual collapse. Slusher denied it, testifying that he was never made aware of any issue with the stone or its foundation and never performed repair work for an individual plot holder, since plot holders were required to purchase their own headstones and arrange installation through third-party vendors. SPPCA's bylaws confirmed this division: the sexton's duties covered general grounds upkeep and placing headstone foundations, but were silent on repairing or installing the stones themselves. The trial court granted summary judgment for the defense on three grounds, and the First District affirmed. On duty, the court held SPPCA owed no duty to Hall because it neither owned nor controlled the headstone, had no actual or constructive notice of any hazardous condition, and faced no history of similar incidents to make the harm foreseeable. This reinforces that a cemetery's—or, more broadly, any property owner's—duty tracks the scope of what it actually owns or controls; a family-purchased monument installed by outside vendors falls outside that scope even though it sits on the owner's land. On respondeat superior, the court rejected vicarious liability against SPPCA even assuming Slusher had done the alleged repair, because that work fell outside the duties the bylaws actually assigned him and mere on-site presence or opportunity was not enough. On causation, the court found the claim too speculative to survive summary judgment. Hall herself testified the tilt was corrected after the alleged repair and stayed corrected for somewhere between two and five years, with no observed defect during frequent visits in between. Citing Ohio's rule that a negligence claim cannot rest on conjecture, the court held that bridging a multi-year gap between an alleged negligent act and the injury was too speculative to reach a jury. The case is notable less for breaking new ground than for stacking three independent, generally-applicable defenses—no duty/no notice, no respondeat superior, and no causation—any one of which alone would have been dispositive. That makes it a useful all-purpose citation for insurers and defense counsel facing negligence claims built on attenuated, long-past conduct, whether or not a cemetery is involved.
