Jury faults convenience store company, awards millions to man severely beaten by robber
A jury has awarded millions to a man who sued the company that runs a Parkland convenience store where he was severely beaten.
William Tisdale’s lawsuit said he was a customer at the store when someone who tried to rob it beat him with a baseball bat in 2015, seriously injuring him and causing major traumatic brain injury.
The 36-year-old sued the company, APRO LLC, in Pierce County Superior Court.
Following several weeks of trial, jurors awarded him $91 million Thursday, minus 10 percent for contributory negligence they found on the part of the plaintiff.
“The verdict establishes standards for convenience stores,” his attorney, Eric Fong, said in a statement Friday. “The companies that operate them rely upon the public for their profit, and they owe it to the community to be safe. The jury found total failure in this regard. This verdict is justified by what APRO failed to do and the horrible injuries to this man.”
Attorneys for APRO did not immediately respond to The News Tribune’s request for comment Friday.
The lawsuit made these allegations about what happened:
Tisdale went to the store at 15119 Pacific Highway South on Nov. 4, 2015.
Before he went inside, another man took cigarettes from behind the counter, pulled out a baseball bat and threatened to kill the clerk if he didn’t give him cash from the register.
The clerk refused and took back the smokes, and as Tisdale entered the clerk asked him to call 911.
Tisdale stepped outside as he tried to call 911, which is when the man with the baseball bat hit him with it repeatedly in the head and body.
“Defendant APRO LLC negligently failed to adopt, implement and enforce policies and procedures to ensure customer safety and security or adopt and implement a safety plan to ensure customer safety and security, as required by industry standards and Washington regulations,” the lawsuit said.
One of Tisdale’s court filings said there were more than 76 police calls, contacts and arrests at the store in a two-year period.
The complaint argued the attack was foreseeable by the clerk.
“Instead of warning plaintiff William Tisdale, or taking action to minimize or prevent the danger to Plaintiff, (the clerk) actively involved Plaintiff in the situation where the risk of harm was immediate, imminent, and in fact did occur,” the lawsuit said.
APRO’s filings in the case said the man with the bat tried to break into Tisdale’s vehicle, and that Tisdale confronted him and was then attacked. The company argued it didn’t owe a duty to prevent the attack by a third party, and that “there is no evidence that APRO was aware he had a violent propensity or that there were prior instances of assaults and carjackings in the parking lot of the store,” one of its motions said.
