Struck while protecting the road
A Houston police officer was in the middle of a DWI arrest — one of the people who runs toward the trouble the rest of us run from — when a second drunk driver struck him.
Texas law saw this coming. The Dram Shop Act exists because a bar that keeps pouring for someone obviously intoxicated is choosing profit over every driver on the road that night. We pursued two sources of accountability at once: the establishment that overserved the driver, and the driver’s own coverage.
The gag terms
Late in the case, the defense tried to attach terms that would have limited what our client could say and do afterward. A police officer, told to stay quiet as a condition of being made whole.
We refused. The case resolved confidentially anyway — for several times what our client had told us he would have accepted — with his voice fully intact.
What the evidence showed
- Two defendants, two theories, one standard of proof.
- The driver who struck the officer had been overserved — the Texas Dram Shop Act claim against the establishment.
- The driver’s own coverage was pursued in parallel.
- The defense’s demand for gag terms was refused, and the case resolved anyway.
What the defense demanded, and the answer
Several times what the client said he would have accepted — and he kept his voice. Terms matter as much as numbers.
More from the record
Every case is different. Prior results depend on the facts of the individual case and do not guarantee a similar outcome.