Los Angeles, Calif. (September 8, 2025) - Los Angeles Partner Laurie N. Stayton obtained a complete defense victory for a global hospitality client in Santa Monica, California, following a 20-day jury trial, three days of deliberation, and more than five years of litigation.
The case stemmed from a tragic 2017 incident in which the plaintiffs' adult daughter visited the client's Hollywood nightclub. After leaving the club safely at 2:00 a.m., she spent the next 13 hours at various other locations before passing away from a drug and alcohol overdose later that afternoon. The plaintiffs filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Ms. Stayton's hospitality client, a club promoter, four individuals, and another Hollywood nightclub.
The plaintiffs alleged that the defendants conspired to drug their daughter, and sought to hold the client directly liable for maintaining a negligent business model and vicariously liable for the alleged actions of the promoter.
Ms. Stayton successfully argued that the client's duty ended once the decedent departed the nightclub safe and unharmed, that the company's hospitality-based business model had been studied and approved by Harvard Business School, and that the promoter was an independent contractor acting on his own at the time of the alleged misconduct.
The jury returned a unanimous defense verdict on all six counts against Ms. Stayton's client, also finding no liability against the other nightclub. Liability was found against four individual defendants, and the case proceeded to damages, where the plaintiffs sought $15 million. The jury ultimately awarded $4 million against the liable individuals.
This verdict comes on the heels of another recent trial win for Ms. Stayton. While litigating the Santa Monica matter, she simultaneously secured a favorable decision in a separate contractual dispute in Orange County, where the court ruled entirely in her client's favor. Notably, she delivered her closing argument in that case the day before jury selection commenced in the wrongful death trial.