Inspired by this act of genius. Summary: 2 students brought pot-laced brownies to share with their college history class, “wacky hijinks” (i.e. ER visits, suspension, arrests) ensue.
If your 19 year college student does something like this and gets sued by one of the victims, could the lawyers go after the parents? Let’s assume the parents did not provide the pot.
May be more IMHO than GQ but since I suspect there is specific legal case law, I thought I’d try GQ first.
Regardless of any actual laws I firmly believe that no, the lawyers should not be able to go after the parents, even if, say, the kid was 17 or even 14 years old. Parents do not and cannot watch their kids 24/7, so why should they be at fault when their supposedly independent enough not to kill themselves kids do something stupid? Kids aren’t pets.
The reality is that no matter what the laws say, the parents are going to be screwed if the crime is high enough profile and politically incorrect in addition to legally incorrect. I know/knew a family caught in all this - mentally ill son finally snapped and killed several people. Between suits against them and more they were almost broken. And in the case of the family whose son shot the policemen here (Pittsburgh), they were broken and his mom basically driven out of the home. More complicated than just that – but it was the end result.
You are liable for an underage child if you failed to adequately supervise them. Notice the huge amount of wiggle room in that - I guess a lawyer could spin that how they wanted. What do you mean, you didn’t notice they had fire-arms and a few potted plants 6 feet ttall in their room?
For adults, the trick to associating guilt is trickier, i assume. However, if the parents can be shown to be sufficiently willfully blind that they basically “allowed” their adult child to use the home as a base to foment their odious illegal schemes, then maybe the jury will buy that line of crap and blame the parents too.
Once the parents are even 1% to blame, they become jointly liable and if the kids can’t pay the damages, the parents are on the hook. Guess who has assets worth chasing?
IANAL, but generally no. Even in the case of a minor, I would think that some sort of willfull negligence would have to be proven on the part of the parents.
Unless the parents were involved in some way, they are not responsible for the actions of their adult children.
I would think, with a 19-year-old, the liability lies solely on that individual. I would not be surprised, however, if the parents were dragged into it if he still lived in their house and used their kitchen to make the brownies.
File a lawsuit, sure. Win a lawsuit, not without some good evidence and/or highly adept lawyering.
http://www.kgw.com/news/Adult-arrested-in-11-7-year-old-gun-investigation-183031091.html
Granted, it’s not an adult child but the opposite. The 7-year old accomplice has not been charged. The community remains outraged.
This.
The excuse for including the parents will probably be that they provided the ingredients for the brownies (except for the pot) – it’s highly likely that the parents buy the groceries for the house – and that they paid for the oven & fuel used to bake the brownies.
Kind of a stretch, but worthwhile to include in the lawsuit – you never know what q jury will do, and the parents have some assets worth going after. Also probably have insurance on the house, which might cover this.
Nobody has ever been confused about this distinction. (Well, maybe the people who constantly pipe up with “Anybody can file a lawsuit against anybody. Winning it is another matter.” Everybody else understands the question.) Please stop bringing it up. It only makes you look like a tool.
People here might understand the distinction, but plenty of people do not. Many people are outraged that people are even allowed to FILE frivolous lawsuits. They do not seem to understand that someone has to decide it is frivolous. I have talked to dozens of these people. When asked who should decide - they just don’t get it - according to them frivolous suits just shouldn’t be allowed - and somehow magically this should be determined without going to court.
Plenty of people also assume because someone has been sued for xyz - that means there is something wrong with the legal system. They do not get that these cases will be dismissed on a motion for summary judgement.
But they will be dismissed on a motion for summary judgment only if such a motion is filed, which usually requires a lawyer, which usually requires paying a lawyer. Even though the lawsuit is obviously frivolous to most sane observers.
Yeah, sure, OK. Since, however, we are talking about posts here on this message board, where it has been acknowledged that there is no confusion about the issue, we can dispense with all the posts that add only the already widely known (at least on this message board) fact that commencing a lawsuit is a much lower hurdle than winning a lawsuit. And that when an OP asks whether one can be sued for something, they are interested in whether that sued can be won–not just filed.
But the dad hasn’t been charged or sued for his son’s actions. He’s been charged for his own actions, allegedly not storing his firearms in a secure fashion, when he has a young child in the house.