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But I do think the bar should have some responsibility to ensure that obviously drunk customers leaving the premises have a safe ride home.
It's one thing for a store to sell alcohol to a customer, who later gets drunk and causes death, and another matter entirely if someone gets drunk or is drunk in a bar and the establishment does nothing.
Two bartenders have been criminally charged after an intoxicated patron left their bar and allegedly caused a fatal crash.
Texas bartenders Shafay Look, 34, and Jon Ward, 56, of the Island Pier Club in Galveston, Texas, were charged with “selling an alcoholic beverage to an intoxicated person” — a 50-year-old woman named Gerilyn Weberlein — who in June allegedly crashed her car into two bicyclists 15 minutes after leaving the bar.
Holy hell. No way do I agree with this. Bartenders do not get paid enough to be every customer's babysitter, especially when they're busy doing their job and serving others.
And "serving alcohol to intoxicated people" is pretty much the definition of the job. Should they have to administer breathalyzer tests to each patron?
That's the 3rd I've heard of in the Houston area. Expect to see more.
Like phma said, dram shop laws have been around forever. Houston just did not enforce them.
Now that we are the drunk driving capitol of the USA, maybe they will get serious. It's hard to be so drunk you don't know you are entering the wrong side of the freeway. Several horrible accidents happened around the Woodlands due to drunk drivers going the wrong way on the freeway. The did not get the bars then.
That young woman who had been drinking in a couple places and killed a mom and baby was the cause of it being used last summer. The bar owner's son was feeding her drinks. The bar maid didn't card her.
Lots of Houston bars will get you a ride home these days.
The key, I think, is whether an employee knowingly sold alcohol to someone who was obviously over the legal limit.
Some people can handle their liquor fairly well -- but if someone buys and consumes, for example, three drinks for himself or herself in under an hour from the same waiter or bartender -- of if someone sells alcohol to someone who is slurring words and cannot walk in a straight line (and does not have a doctor's note stating that the condition is due to a physical ailment of some kind), I think that is a criminal action and should be treated as such.
Eh doesn't matter how much they serve, not their responsibility. No way to know if people are Ubering/taxi'ing home or whatever. Each individual should be responsible for their own actions, the people around them should not be required to be their keepers by law.
As a Houston area resident, a big part of the issue is law enforcement, or lack thereof. Impared driving is more of a challenge than a crime here. So many roads and freeways, and so little enforcement on the freeways because there's too much going on on surface streets.
Really, so long as you can keep to a freeway, and keep it generally between the lines, everyone could drive drunk here (some days it seems that's exactly what is going on)
The key, I think, is whether an employee knowingly sold alcohol to someone who was obviously over the legal limit.
Some people can handle their liquor fairly well -- but if someone buys and consumes, for example, three drinks for himself or herself in under an hour from the same waiter or bartender -- of if someone sells alcohol to someone who is slurring words and cannot walk in a straight line (and does not have a doctor's note stating that the condition is due to a physical ailment of some kind), I think that is a criminal action and should be treated as such.
In Chicago and probably other large cities, many people walk or take a cab or uber when they're going to be drinking.
It's unreasonable to expect bartenders to babysit. In a busy bar that would be impossible. Then we have the issue of people going to a bar and ordering a few drinks to carry back to a bar table.
In MA, anyone with a job that requires serving alcohol is required to take and pass TiPS training. We are not allowed to over-serve any customer.
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