The VLW Blog

A five-member majority of the Supreme Court of Virginia has attempted to clarify its holding in the controversial case involving the death of a teenage girl during a sleepover visit with a friend.
In Kellermann v. McDonough, the court established a general duty for host parents to supervise and care for a child guest entrusted to [...]

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Rockbridge County Circuit Judge Michael Irvine has granted a defense motion to strike a wrongful death lawsuit after a jury deadlocked over liability for a teen’s 2006 drowning at a Lexington city park.
Charles Volpe, 16, drowned while swimming at a city park when he became trapped underwater below a low head dam on the Maury [...]

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A parent who heard the dad of her daughter’s 14-year-old friend expressly say, “No boys with cars,” must face a wrongful death claim filed by the girl’s estate, the Supreme Court of Virginia said today.
The dad, Michael Kellermann, sued Paul and Paula McDonough after his daughter Jaimee died in an automobile accident in December 2004. [...]

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The Supreme Court of Virginia dropped the other shoe today in the second of two wrongful death cases involving charities that it heard in October. As we reported here last week, the court reinstated by unpublished order a dismissal by a judge who concluded that the plaintiff had not shown the gross negligence required to [...]

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The Supreme Court of Virginia heard arguments in October in two cases in – Halsey  v. Grafton Schools, Record No. 080023, and Zapata v. Community Alternatives Inc., Record No. 072477 – in which trial judges dismissed wrongful death cases involving charities. 
The court reversed and remanded Halsey today by unpublished order. With Justice Cynthia D. Kinser [...]

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A Boy Scout who was infected by a toxic strain of E. coli at a Virginia scout camp today filed suit against a California food supplier, according to a law firm news release.
The suit naming S & S Foods of California was filed in Augusta County Circuit Court.  In August, 84 people at the Goshen [...]

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This could easily be a leftover question from last month’s bar exam. The topic: Premises liability. The issue: Adequacy of notice. Here are the facts.
You’re a shopowner in Marblehead, Mass., a grand old town along the Atlantic, north of Boston. The U.S. Navy was founded here, in fact. You own an old building with gutter [...]

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Employees at a Harrisonburg medical supplies office say they tried to warn their boss about a coworker’s strange and threatening behavior. But because the company, American HomePatient Inc., allegedly turned a deaf ear, it now faces the possibility of punitive damages on a claim for negligent retention.
Last spring, a man named Brewer Hoover Jr. developed [...]

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