108
C
ASE: 14
You Be the Judge!
You Be the Judge!
Sources
The case brie ng above contains excerpts and direct extractions from the sources noted
below that have been combined with the author's own expert legal input. The case has
been condensed and formatted from its original content for purposes of this workbook.
Nivens v. 7-11 Hoagy's Corner, 133 Wash.2d 192, 943 P.2d 286, (Wash. 1997).
Supreme Court of Washington
October 1, 1997. Amended opinion written by the Honorable Justice Phillip Talmadge.
Small businesses use
employee handbooks to
inform employees of the
companys policies and
expectations.
7-11 called a longtime customer, John Shadduck, as a witness. He
had no recollection of any acts of violence at the store. In fact, Shad-
duck stated customers had to be well-behaved or they would be asked
to leave.
7-11 employee, Kathleen Anderson, testi ed that the majority of
teens and young adults who came to the store did not cause trouble
and were well-behaved. For the entire year preceding the incident,
she never observed any ghts or altercations between customers and
the teens in the parking lot and no customer complaints had been
received.
Plainti Nivens sued the Defendant for money damages for his in-
juries claiming that the Defendant was negligent in failing to provide
adequate security at the 7-11 store.
Defendant, 7-11, argued that because there was no evidence of
prior violence toward customers, the criminal act was unforeseeable--
it did not know and had no reason to know that a criminal act would
occur.
For Evaluation Purposes Only