Texas Dram Shop Law

Under Texas law, it’s illegal for licensed alcohol providers like bars, restaurants, and liquor stores to serve minors or obviously intoxicated adults. When those businesses break the law and someone gets hurt, they can be sued and held liable. This area of the law is known as dram shop law. The purpose of this guide is to explain Texas dram shop law in a way that is useful to non-lawyers.

But why?

The biggest reason is that most people who are hurt or who lose a loved one due to the unsafe service of alcohol never pursue their case. In many unfortunate cases, they simply don’t know they can sue. Because of that the majority of law-breaking alcohol providers go unpunished, and that has to change.

If you were injured or lost a loved one due to unsafe alcohol service, we hope this guide will help you understand your rights. We also hope to impress upon you that there’s more at stake than just your case. The cold, hard reality is that you may be in a position where suing the negligent alcohol provider who hurt you or your family helps prevent another person or family from experiencing the same kind of pain.

Only when every victim makes every bad bar feel the sting of a lawsuit will the industry change. We hope this guide plays some small role in achieving that goal. 

Chapter 1 - The Basics of How Dram Shop Law Works

There are only two offenses an alcohol provider may commit for which they can be sued:

1. Serving alcohol to an obviously intoxicated adult, resulting in an injury or death.
2. Serving alcohol to a minor, resulting in injury or death.

When an alcohol provider commits either of these "improper service of alcohol" offenses, they can be sued by the people that improper service harms.

As you can see, the law treats alcohol providers differently based on whether they improperly served a minor or an adult. We'll come back to that in Chapters 3 and 4. For now, we need to bring you up to speed on a couple of other concepts relevant to dram shop law.

Who Counts as an Alcohol Provider?

We use the term "alcohol provider" to describe any person or entity who is licensed by the State of Texas to sell alcohol, anyone who is not licensed but sells alcohol anyway, and the workers or employees of those vendors.

Thus, Texas dram shop law applies to:

• Bars
• Restaurants
• Caterers
• Airlines
• Movie Theaters
• Stadiums
• Liquor Stores
• Grocery Stores
• Convenience Stores

...and any other establishment that sells alcohol.

What About Home Owners and Individuals?

Texas law imposes liability on regular people (read: not businesses) only when they serve alcohol to a minor who is not a member of their family. In other words, if Bob serves alcohol to his 17-year-old neighbor, resulting in injury, then Bob can be liable for the damage done. This is called social host liability and is covered in more detail later in this guide.

To be clear, that's the only scenario where a regular person can face liability for an alcohol-related incident. It's important to know that because eyewitnesses sometimes avoid getting involved in dram shop cases, since they worry they can be sued for not stopping their intoxicated friend. That's not how it works. If Juan and Karen go to a bar, and Juan knows Karen is drunk but doesn't cut her off or call her a cab, and then Karen dies in a wreck, Juan is not liable. There is no mechanism under Texas law by which Juan could be sued as an individual for an alcohol-related incident where the drinker is an adult.

Those are the most basic concepts in dram shop law, but why do we even have dram shop law in the first place?

Chapter 2 — Where Does Dram Shop Law Come From?

In a nutshell, dram shop law is the idea that victims of alcohol-related incidents can sue alcohol providers when those providers break certain rules.

The law holds alcohol providers to different standards depending on whether the drinker was an adult or a minor, and we'll discuss that in the following chapters.

But the best way to understand dram shop law is to learn its origin story.

For most of Texas history, bars were immune from lawsuits stemming from drunk driving accidents. There was no cause of action recognized by the courts enabling a victim to sue a bar. This all changed in the 1987 via a court case (El Chico v. Poole) and action by the Texas Legislature.

El Chico was based on an accident in which a man named Larry Poole was killed by a drunk driver who had been drinking at an El Chico restaurant. It was illegal under Texas law for an alcohol provider to serve alcohol to an already-drunk customer, but that just meant the State could fine a provider who broke this rule, not that victims could sue for the injuries they sustained as a result of the violation.

Larry Poole's family disagreed with this logic and argued that both El Chico and the drunk driver should be liable for the accident, given that the drunk driver had been served so much alcohol that he blacked out and had no recollection of the events of that evening.

The matter worked its way to the Texas Supreme Court, which ruled that yes—bars can be sued for the improper service of alcohol.

The logic was solid: In Texas, we don't have a million individual laws that say things like, "You can sue someone when they accidentally hit you with a rock; you can sue someone when they carelessly push you off a ladder; you can sue someone when you slip on their icy stairs" and so on. Instead, we have a general negligence law which basically says anyone can be sued when they have a duty not to be careless yet are careless and cause a foreseeable injury. This general negligence law can be applied to a wide variety of circumstances and is quite useful.

Some bad actors, however, are excepted from this general rule. For instance, most states don't let workers sue their employers or the state government, even when they are negligent. The idea at work is that those entities are special and shouldn't be held accountable under the normal negligence rules. So, when the Texas Supreme Court decided the El Chico v. Poole case, they were really answering the question of whether alcohol providers are special and should be immune from negligence law. The Court decided bars were not special and that they could be sued for negligence.

Enter the Texas Dram Shop Act.

While all this was going on, the Texas Legislature saw which way the winds were blowing at the Texas Supreme court and started drafting the Texas Dram Shop Act— later codified in Chapter 2, Sec. 2.01–2.03 of the Alcoholic Beverages Code. Trying to get ahead of the courts, Texas lawmakers tried to answer such questions such as: Could providers be sued when they serve one drink too many? Five drinks too many? Ten? Could they be sued for accidents where the drinkers hurt themselves or only when they hurt someone else? No one at the time was certain how the court would rule on the matter.

This new law that emerged was called The Texas Dram Shop Act. In a bit of curious timing the legislature passed the Act shortly before the Supreme Court ruled in El Chico v. Poole. However, the governor did not sign the bill into law until after the Court issued its ruling. The effect of this is still felt to the day. Generally speaking, the Texas Dram Shop Act governs most cases, but there are areas of the law where El Chico v. Poole speaks to issues not addressed in the dram shop act, in which case it is still valid case law.

The Texas Dram Shop Act—lays down the rules that govern dram shop lawsuits. The Act creates two sets of rules for dram shop cases: One set for adults injured due to illegal alcohol service, and another set of rules that apply to minors under 18 years of age. Let's look at how each of those work. The issues where El Chico v. Poole is still used by the court are much narrower.

Chapter 3 — How Dram Shop Law Applies to Adult Drinkers

The vast majority of dram shop cases involve adults injured by unlawful alcohol service. This means that a licensed alcohol provider over-served someone and that person later injured himself or others. It's perhaps easiest to think of the rules that govern these cases as the norm and those that apply to minor drinkers as an exception (we'll tackle that exception in the next chapter).

Before we get into what the law says about these cases, you must understand what it means when a lawyer discusses elements. In a legal case, the elements are what you must prove in order to have a valid lawsuit. Elements in a lawsuit function the same way as ingredients in a recipe. For instance, a ham sandwich requires two ingredients, ham and bread. If you have only bread, you don't have a ham sandwich. If you have ham but not bread, it's still not a ham sandwich.

In a similar way, the Texas Dram Shop Act requires those who bring a dram shop lawsuit to prove two elements. Those are:

1. At the time the provision occurred it was apparent to the provider that the individual being sold, served, or provided with an alcoholic beverage was obviously intoxicated to the extent that he presented a clear danger to himself and others; and
2. The intoxication of the recipient of the alcoholic beverage was a proximate cause of the damages suffered.

Let's tackle each of those elements in turn. The first element establishes a behavior—serving alcohol—and draws a line that alcohol providers can't cross: Serving alcohol to an obviously intoxicated person. Because of this element, the person bringing the dram shop claim must furnish some evidence that a bar served a drinker and also evidence that they did so when the drinker was obviously intoxicated.

This raises the question, how is a bar supposed to know that their customer is obviously intoxicated or a danger to himself or others? More importantly, from the perspective of someone pursuing a dram shop case, how do they prove that a bar over-served an obviously intoxicated person?

Understanding Obvious Intoxication

There are a number of ways to prove that an alcohol provider served someone who was obviously intoxicated. At a certain threshold, usually around a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .15-.17, or roughly twice the legal limit to drive a vehicle, almost everyone exhibits clear signs of intoxication. In the aftermath of most serious accidents involving alcohol, authorities will obtain a blood sample from those suspected of drinking. Even if they don't, security footage, receipts, and witness testimony can be used to establish a provider served an obviously intoxicated person.

Let's look at a couple of examples to better illustrate what obvious intoxication means in practice.

Example #1: John is an average-sized man who goes into a bar. In the first 30 minutes he's there, John orders and consumes two beers. John goes up to the bar and orders a third drink and is served. After the third drink, John is too drunk to legally drive, but is served no more alcohol. For most people, consuming two drinks in a short period of time puts them right up against the legal limit to drive a car. The third drink almost certainly pushes them over that limit. But the third drink was served before John would have likely displayed an signs of obvious intoxication. In this scenario, the bar probably can't be sued under the Texas Dram Shop Act because they didn't serve an obviously intoxicated person. This example shows that bars who follow the rules in Texas can serve a person until they're drunk, but must stop service at that point to avoid dram shop liability.

Example #2: Kevin is also an average-sized man. He goes into a bar with friends and orders a round of shots and a beer. A half hour later he does the same. And then a half hour after that, he orders another round. After an hour has passed, Kevin goes up and orders a beer. At this point, Kevin has consumed 6 drinks in a hour and is likely in the neighborhood of 1.5 times the legal limit. If the bartender serves Kevin at this point, he should know that it's very likely that a person who has just finished off 6 drinks in an hour is intoxicated and refuse service. But should the bartender serve Kevin a 7th drink, he's likely served an obviously intoxicated person. From that point on, if Kevin's drunkenness causes him to injure himself or someone else, the injured party can probably satisfy the first element of a Texas dram shop case.

The takeaway is that alcohol providers can't be sued under the Texas Dram Shop Act just because they served alcohol to someone. In fact, there are many situations where a bar can serve alcohol to a person who may be slightly above the legal limit to drive a vehicle and escape liability. It's when bars continue to serve someone even after it's obvious that they're drunk that bars put themselves at risk of being sued.

Now, most people would read that and assume that given how generous Texas Dram Shop law is to alcohol providers, these cases should be few and far between. The sad reality is that many alcohol providers regularly break these rules, resulting in many unnecessary injuries and deaths. Because of that recklessness, dram shop cases are far more common than they should be.

This brings us to the second element of a dram shop lawsuit...

What Do We Mean When We Say Alcohol Must Be the Proximate Cause of the Damages Suffered?

Even when an alcohol provider serves an obviously intoxicated person who then hurts someone, it doesn't mean the bar is always responsible for what happens next. For the bar to be held liable, the Texas Dram Shop Act requires that the unlawful alcohol service be the proximate cause of the resulting injuries. What does this mean?

Without delving too deeply into the weeds of proximate cause, this provision places the burden on the victim to prove that the unlawful alcohol service led to their injury.

In a drunk driving crash, the connection between a drunk driver that was over-served and the injury their victims sustained is quite obviously related to the alcohol. A similar connection can be drawn between most people who sustain catastrophic fall injuries or die as a result of being over-served. However, there are certain scenarios where a bar over-serves a person who suffers an injury or dies due to some other circumstances.

For example: Suppose a bartender serves Jen ten drinks in two hours, which is almost certainly an unlawful amount over that short a time. Afterward, Jen decides to drive her car home. While waiting at a red light, an 18-wheeler rear-ends Jen's vehicle, killing her in the process. In such a scenario, it's very unlikely that Jen's loved ones could bring a successful dram shop claim against the bar. Certainly, they broke the law, but it wasn't their actions that led to her death. An outside actor intervened and caused the death.

Most of the time, the fact that alcohol played a role is easy to establish. If a drunk driver has too much, fails to negotiate a turn, and crashes into a tree, it's difficult for a bar to argue that alcohol wasn't the proximate cause of the crash. But because scenarios exist where the bar's unlawful behavior is incidental to someone's injury, legislators added this step to protect bars from being liable for situations their behavior did not cause.

Now that you know the elements of a dram shop lawsuit, let's discuss what that means for you. The most important takeaway is that the law burdens you with proving that an alcohol provider over-served an obviously intoxicated person, and that the unlawful alcohol service caused your injuries and/or losses. That means the ball is in your court and it's up to you to take action. Failing to act is essentially giving the alcohol provider a "get out of jail free" card for their carelessness. As many lawbreaking bars don't mend their ways until they've faced consequences for their dangerous behavior, this often means they keep on over-serving until someone holds them accountable for it.

Chapter 4 - How Dram Shop Law Applies to Minor Drinkers

As with most areas of the law, dram shop law makes a distinction between adults and minors. Before we discuss how those distinctions apply to minor drinkers, it's important to understand just what a minor drinker is and why lawmakers drew the line where they did.

For the purposes of dram shop law, a minor is a person under 18 years old. This can be confusing, since the drinking age is 21. Despite the potential for confusion, there is a reason not to extend special protections to drinkers between 18 and 20. The law generally protects those under 18 to a greater degree than it does adults, because we expect adults to follow all of society's rules while recognizing that children are still learning them. If dram shop law provided special protections for adults not yet old enough to drink, then the law would in effect reward adults for breaking it.

What Are the Elements of a Dram Shop Case Involving a Minor Drinker?

In the previous chapter, we learned that for a dram shop case to be viable when it involves an adult drinker, the bar must serve an obviously intoxicated person who is a danger to themselves or others and that alcohol must be the proximate cause of the injury.

When the drinker is under 18, dram shop law is much simpler. Instead of delving into the weeds of obvious intoxication, licensed alcohol providers must either have:

1. served or provided to the minor any of the alcoholic beverages that contributed to the minor's intoxication; or
2. allowed the minor to be served or provided any of the alcoholic beverages that contributed to the minor's intoxication on the premises owned or leased by the adult.

Further, the intoxication must result in someone's injury. In a nutshell, when the drinker is a minor the law only asks that the person bringing the case establish that an adult served someone under 18, and that the alcohol service led to injuries.

Unlike how the law treats adult drinkers, the rules regarding minors that are served alcohol don't just apply to licensed alcohol providers. Pretty much any adult (with a few exceptions we'll discuss shortly) could face dram shop liability if they allow a minor to consume alcohol and that minor goes on to injure someone.

Another difference that we touched on briefly is that when the drinker is a minor, there is no obvious intoxication standard. While an alcohol provider can lawfully serve a drinker enough alcohol to get them drunk and still avoid dram shop liability if they stopped service before the drinker was obviously intoxicated, the bar is set much lower for minors: Any amount of alcohol that leads to an injury is enough to trigger dram shop liability for the adult who provided the alcohol.

As previously mentioned, there are certain exceptions related to adults providing alcohol to minors. The provisions of dram shop law that concern minor drinkers apply to all adults except the child's:

• Parent,
• Guardian,
• Spouse, or
• "An adult in whose custody the minor has been committed by a court."

If anyone in the above categories provides alcohol to minor drinker, there is no dram shop liability.

If we were to make a Cliffs' notes version of how Texas dram shop law applies to minor drinkers it would be:

1. Did an adult serve alcohol to a child?
2. Did that alcohol service cause an injury?

When the answer to both questions is yes, then there is likely a dram shop claim.

Chapter 5 - Which Types of Alcohol Providers Can Be Sued?

There can be a lot of confusion over who can be sued under the Texas Dram Shop Act. For instance, we've read about lawsuits against beer distributors or even alcohol manufacturers in the aftermath of a drunk driving accident. These are not dram shop lawsuits and are generally not supported by the law in Texas.

Instead, it's unlawfully serving alcohol to an obviously intoxicated person that make it possible to sue a person or business. Through this lens, you can see why lawsuits against a distributor or manufacturer don't make a lot of sense. They're selling a legal product in a legal manner, whereas an alcohol provider sued in a dram shop case is accused of selling a legal product in an unlawful manner.

Generally speaking, any business that has a liquor license to sell alcohol to the general public can be sued when they unlawfully serve a person who goes on to injure himself or another. This means that it doesn't matter whether the overservice occurred at a bar, liquor store, grocery store, stadium, or other licensed venue—any of these businesses can be sued when they serve obviously intoxicated people.

And while dram shop law gives broad protections to social hosts, or people hosting private parties, those protections go away when they start providing alcohol to kids that aren't theirs. When they cross that line, they also can be sued for any resulting harm.

Rather than giving you a rundown of every potential business that can be sued, we argue that it's better to seek out someone familiar with this area of the law, relate the specifics of your case, and let them tell you whether or not that particular business can be sued. That may be an unsatisfying answer, but the number and variety of alcohol providers in a state as large as Texas is simply too vast to fit into one all-encompassing list.

Furthermore, it's not always known at the outset of a case who the responsible alcohol provider is. Our firm takes on many cases where a person was injured due to unlawful alcohol service, but the person seeking our help has no idea where the drinker who injured their loved obtained and consumed their alcohol. During the course of our investigation, we'll sift through credit card statements, cell phone records, and even social media posts in order to identify where a drinker was prior to their accident.

It's important to know that it's not your job to come to an attorney with all the answers. If you have serious injuries due to an alcohol-related incident, that's enough for us to take an interest in the matter and to do our part to find out what happened, who's responsible, and how we can hold them accountable.

Chapter 6 - What Does Texas Law Require of Bars?

Believe it or not, many people consider dram shop law to be unfair to bars. There are quite a few people who believe that it's an alcohol provider's job to serve as much alcohol as a person over 21 wants (it's not). Others believe that responsibility for any alcohol-related injury falls only on the drinker (it doesn't). The truth is that our laws recognize the dangers of alcohol and make (in our opinion) very minimal demands on bars, as a condition of obtaining a liquor license.

We've already mentioned the requirement in the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Code that prohibits bars from serving obviously intoxicated persons. In addition, there are other regulations regarding serving samples to patrons, which also prohibit serving intoxicated persons. As far as dram shop law goes, that's really the only requirement bars have: Don't keep serving people who are already obviously drunk. It seems simple.

What's more, dram shop law builds in extra protections for bars. Alcohol providers raised the issue with legislators that they could do everything possible to comply with the law, but one careless employee could undo all those efforts. To protect against this scenario, legislators added section 106.14 to the Alcoholic Beverage Code. It states that an employer isn't liable for the actions of an employee if they meet the following conditions:

1. the employer requires its employees to attend a commission-approved seller training program;
2. the employee has actually attended such a training program; and
3. the employer has not directly or indirectly encouraged the employee to violate such law.

This area of the law provides employers with a safe harbor defense: If they require employees to obtain training, ensure those employees actually get the training, and don't do anything to encourage employees to serve unlawfully, they cannot be held liable if a rogue employee serves an obviously intoxicated person who hurts or kills someone afterward.

Put most simply, the law requires bars not to serve people who are obviously intoxicated to avoid consequences. Even if they can't meet that low standard, they can still avoid liability by following three simple rules.

Given just how little the law requires of bars, it may seem next to impossible for anyone to sue a bar and win. In fact, that's why most personal injury attorneys don't handle dram shop cases. They believe they're unwinnable because the law stacks the deck in a bar's favor. Stop and think about that and what you've heard about lawyers. Lawyers, who, as a profession, have a reputation for finding ways to sue just about anyone, generally won't touch a dram shop case. Does that sound like a law that unjustly punishes alcohol providers? When you understand how the law works, it's tough to argue that it does.

Of course, these concerns haven't stopped us from pursuing dram shop cases for the last three decades. Let's take a moment to explain what makes Grossman Law Offices different.

Chapter 7 - Why Don't Most Lawyers Handle Dram Shop Cases?

There are generally two reasons that a lawyer won't pursue a case: Either they believe they can't win it, or they think they won't recover enough money to justify the time and expense of pursuing it.

Given that dram shop cases usually involve death or serious injuries, the damages are typically sufficient to justify pursuing these cases. Still, while any personal injury attorney in Texas would love to get his hands on a commercial vehicle case where someone died or suffered serious injuries, many attorneys won't touch dram shop cases is because they believe they are unwinnable (They're wrong, but we'll get to that in a moment).

Why do so many attorneys look at dram shop cases that way? There are three aspects of the law that when taken together lead many attorneys to erroneously believe that Texas dram shop cases are unwinnable. They are:

1. Proving the Bar Served an Obviously Intoxicated Person — Since alcohol providers can only be sued when they serve an obviously intoxicated person, they have a ready-made defense in that they can argue they didn't do that. The plaintiff is burdened with proving that the provider did in fact engage in unlawful alcohol service, which often involves a mix of witness testimony, receipts, toxicology, and expert testimony. It's by no means impossible, but it is a very technical process. To further complicate matters, it's a technical process that an attorney must explain to a jury of ordinary citizens in a way that makes sense to them. Many attorneys don't see a way to navigate these complexities.
   
2. The Safe Harbor Defense — If an alcohol provider can show they required their employees to complete a TABC-approved alcohol safety course, ensured their employees took such a course, and didn't do anything to encourage unlawful service, then it doesn't matter if you prove that they served an obviously intoxicated person, they're shielded from liability as a matter of law. This presents a real threat to any dram shop case because it's basically a free pass for the bar. If the alcohol provider can prove the safe harbor elements, your case is over.
   
   The threat posed by safe harbor is very real, but also not insurmountable. What many attorneys don't realize is that alcohol providers that serve obviously intoxicated people often do so because of failures at the management level to discourage such service. Further, a little digging almost always reveals some deficiency in training and enforcement of safe alcohol service standards. Is proving that a provider directly or indirectly encouraged its employees to break the law time-consuming? Absolutely, but it can certainly be done. In fact, in litigating these cases for the past 30 years, Grossman Law Offices has never had a bar successfully invoke safe harbor in one of our cases.
   
3. The Duenez (2007) Case — For nearly two decades, plenty of attorneys handled dram shop cases. A Texas Supreme Court decision changed that: After dram shop law became a reality in Texas, courts treated the actions of the drunk and the bar like they would treat criminals involved in a conspiracy. Any fault on the drunk was automatically fault on the bar and vice versa. This changed with the Duenez case. The court ruled that the alleged wrong-doing of a drunk driver and an alcohol provider's unlawful alcohol service were sufficiently different that juries had to weigh them separately when apportioning fault. As a result, it forced plaintiffs to argue their cases differently and highlight the specific wrongs of the bar, not just that they served an obviously intoxicated person.
   
   In the aftermath of Duenez, many personal injury firms stopped accepting dram shop cases. Many attorneys (incorrectly, in most cases) simply assumed that the drinker generally has the most blame in any alcohol-related incident where someone sustains an injury. This fails to consider how badly many providers screw up in the lead-up to a serious drunk driving accident. While Duenez made dram shop lawsuits even more technical, it didn't make them unwinnable.

The combination of proving obvious intoxication, safe harbor, and separating the bar's fault from the drinker's led many attorneys to conclude that Texas dram shop cases aren't worth the effort. However, that has not been our experience. While the built-in advantages for alcohol providers means that a dram shop case is rarely if ever easy, the injured can still prevail in a Texas dram shop case if their attorney understands those technicalities and has experience crafting cases to overcome those challenges.

An Example of How to Overcome the Obstacles Presented by Texas Dram Shop Law

Let's look at an example to illustrate how an attorney can overcome these challenges. We recently litigated a case where someone was over-served at a multiple establishments prior to running a stop sign, t-boning a family in their van, and leaving a small child with a brain injury.

The drunk driver began his evening at a restaurant, where he was over-served. He then moved on to another bar, where despite his condition he was served even more alcohol. Lastly he went back to the bar at the original restaurant, where he was served even more before that bar eventually threw him out. The drunk then picked a fight with his companion and stumbled to his vehicle, where he made the fateful decision to get behind the wheel.

Each of the two establishments claimed they didn't serve an obviously intoxicated person, but our toxicologist showed the drunk driver was nearly 3 times the legal limit at the time of the crash. For most people that would mean not only having trouble with balance, motor coordination, and slurred speech, but also being on the verge of blacking out and losing consciousness.

The testimony of the the toxicologist made it clear that it would have been nearly impossible for any bartender not to notice signs of intoxication if they so much as looked at their customer. The testimony of the bartenders made it clear that they didn't, which is why they kept serving him.

What about safe harbor? When it became clear to the bars that they would be laughed out of court if they tried to argue that their staff didn't serve an obviously intoxicated person, they tried to throw the staff under the bus by claiming that the restaurant did everything right and the bartenders simply went rogue.

Had the bar won this argument, our clients' case would have been over. However, we knew from experience that most of the time when a bar over-serves a drinker to the point that they injure someone, it stems from a failure that starts with management. In this case, our attorneys were able to show that the bars' training materials were inadequate, management supervision did not exist, and management's failure to properly train and supervise the bartenders added up to an indirect encouragement to break the law.

Unable to show that their employees didn't serve an obviously intoxicated person and having failed to convincingly argue that the employees' actions weren't encouraged by the bars, the parties in the case agreed to settle the matter on terms favorable to our clients.

This case is one of many which demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief in parts of the legal profession, dram shop cases are winnable.

Chapter 8 - FAQ

How Do I Know If I have a Dram Shop Case?

The best way to know if you have a dram shop case is to speak with a knowledgeable attorney. Our view is that if alcohol contributed to your accident and you sustained an injury, at the very least it's best to discuss your situation so we can help you make an informed decision about whether or not to proceed with a dram shop case.

Unfortunately, our experience tells us that most people don't even know that dram shop law exists, and even among those that do, they have a tendency to talk themselves out of what would otherwise be a viable claim. We would encourage everyone not to do this.

While there are many factors that go into determining whether or not a case can move forward, most people don't know this area of the law well enough to make that decision. That's why dram shop lawyers exist and are happy to discuss your circumstances 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

What Is My Dram Shop Case Worth?

At some point, every client will ask for us to tell them what we think their case is worth. While the value varies based on the facts unique to each case, there are some general rules that we can provide that will help you get an idea of how much your case may be worth.

1. The Severity of Your Losses — The severity of injuries is the most important factor in determining your case's value. This may leave you to ask, "how do I calculate my losses?" There are many categories of damages that a victim may to recover in a lawsuit. Some, like medical bills and lost earnings, are fairly easy to assess since they have clear numerical values. Hospitals charge for medical care, and it's quite easy to show how much money you lost due to not being able to work.
   
   Other damages are a bit harder to price. There's no chart to find the quantified price of losing a spouse, son or daughter, or mother or father. Similarly, it's difficult to reliably predict how much juries will award for your pain and suffering or the loss of a loved one.
   
   As a general rule, add up your medical bills and lost wages, then add an additional fraction of that to arrive at a rough estimate of how much your case is worth. Similarly, if you lost a close loved one, your case could be worth hundreds of thousands or more depending on the nature and closeness of of your relationship.
   
2. Venue Matters — At the end of the day, it's a jury of regular citizens that determines the value of your case. Generally speaking, juries across the state uniformly award victims medical damages, lost wages, and other losses that are easy to price. Where things can vary from one locality to another is when it comes time to put a price on non-monetary losses. For instance, how much juries award to an adult claimant for the loss of a parent can vary considerably. In some parts of the state, a jury may regard it as a lesser blow to an adult, whereas juries in other regions might see it as a seven-figure loss.
   
3. The Amount of Culpability You Have — Bars are free to argue that you or your loved one bear some responsibility for your losses. Since Texas has a system of comparative fault, every bit of blame they successfully put on you reduces the the amount they must pay out. This is particularly important in dram shop cases.
   
   For instance, if you were the drinker in the incident, the bar is free to argue that your decision to drink was more to blame for your injuries than their decision to unlawfully serve you. In fact, if they succeed with this argument, you can lose your case altogether. However, if you were struck by a drunk driver and blameless, then all of the fault will rest with the bar and the drinker, which means your award for damages will not be diminished.
   

Of course, the best way to learn what your case could be worth is to speak with an attorney. An experienced dram shop lawyer can account for all the specific variables of your case and give you an informed opinion of what they think it is worth. Most importantly, they attorney should be able to tell you why they believe your case is worth that amount. If they can't, that's a big red flag and you should consider getting a second or even third opinion.

How Long Does a Dram Shop Case Take?

From the time you hire an attorney, it should typically take between 12 and 24 months to resolve a dram shop case. With that being said, there are cases that wrap up more quickly and others that take longer. Each case is unique.

There are a number of factors that go into determining how long a case takes, some of which your attorney can control and others that are out of his hands. For instance, in order to have an idea of the full value of the case, it's necessary for you to complete your treatment, or at the very least obtain a long-term prognosis that can be used to determine how much medical care you'll need in the future. If you stop and think about it, a large portion of your case's value is tied to your medical bills. If your doctors are in the process of treating you, they can't really know how much that will cost. These delays are unavoidable.

Other unavoidable delays can include court scheduling, as some courts have more cases to schedule than others. There is also no way to know just how long the alcohol provider's attorneys will fight the case. A general rule is that they'll continue to fight until they start believing they have no chance of prevailing. That means part of your attorney's job is to impress upon the other side that they're going to lose in court, and badly.

However, there are factors that attorneys can control, such as investigating thoroughly, scheduling depositions in a timely manner, and generally moving the process forward through efficient attention to detail. The point is that while 12 to 24 months may seem like a long time to resolve a case, there should always be something happening to move your case toward resolution.

Are Texas Dram Shop Cases Winnable?

If you call most personal injury firms in Texas, it's not unusual to be advised that while you have a potential dram shop case, it's likely unwinnable. This is 100% wrong.

Handled correctly, a Texas dram shop case is wholly winnable. We touched earlier on how and why most personal injury law firms in Texas don't deal with dram shop cases, most of which revolves around their belief that they can't succeed. Over the last three decades, our track record has proven otherwise.

Does this mean that the facts in your particular case add up to an actionable dram shop case? That depends on your unique circumstances, but if you've been told by an attorney that Texas dram shop cases can't be won, Grossman Law has shown over and over that's not true. We'd encourage you to reach out to us for a free consultation with a firm that won't quit before even starting.

While there is no such thing as an open and shut dram shop case, there are in fact winnable dram shop cases.

Where Is Grossman Law Offices Located?

Grossman Law Offices' main office is in Dallas, TX, but our attorneys litigate cases throughout Texas. If you believe you have a case, you can reach us to discuss your situation via telephone, our website, our office, or we'll even come straight to you.