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Widow gets settlement from pawnshop
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Widow gets settlement from pawnshop
By Pat Moore, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 26, 2002
The Florida Supreme Court has refused to review a controversial appeals court ruling that declared an Okeechobee pawnshop negligent for selling a gun to a mildly retarded man three days before he killed an Ohio tourist four years ago.
The decision ended a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the widow of tourist Sonny George Jones against Williams Gun & Pawn, the shop that sold a.38-caliber handgun to Jamie Lofton in November 1998.
"This means people in the gun business have an added liability if they are going to sell a gun to a mentally disturbed person, even if that person is not noticeably weird," Stuart attorney Jack Sobel said.
His client, Nellie Jones, 43, of New Strattsville, Ohio, received the balance of a $275,000 settlement, plus $34,000 in interest, from the pawnshop's insurance carrier after the Supreme Court rejected the case last month, he said.
Scott Mager, the Fort Lauderdale attorney who defended the pawnshop in the lawsuit, argued his clients followed all the legal requirements when selling the gun to Lofton, who filled out the application himself, passed federal background checks and never had been judged mentally incompetent.
Lofton, 29, was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.
The pawnshop's owner and Jones agreed to settle the case for the insurance company's policy limits last year while their attorneys challenged the constitutionality of a Florida law that makes it illegal to sell weapons to anyone under the age of 18 -- or to anyone with "an unsound mind."
Okeechobee Circuit Judge Burton Conner originally ruled that the pawnshop was not liable for Lofton's actions, saying the law was unconstitutionally vague because it does not state how a gun dealer is supposed to determine someone's mental state.
But the 4th District Court of Appeals reversed Conner's ruling and found the law clear, saying Lofton fit the dictionary definition of someone with an unsound mind.
He had a second-grade reading level, attended special education classes for the mentally handicapped in elementary school, never held a job and always lived at home.
Sobel said had the pawnshop owners looked further, they would have discovered Lofton was receiving Social Security disability benefits and had never worked and never was able to get a driver license.
Mager argued the 4th District Court ruling places an unfair burden on gun shop owners to determine a customer's mental capacity.
He said another Okeechobee gun shop refused to sell Lofton a gun a month earlier because it didn't appear Lofton knew what he was doing.
"This means gun dealers will face some added liability if they aren't a little more diligent in screening their customers," Sobel said.
http://www.gopbi.com/partners/pbpost/epaper/editions/today/martin_stlucie_d391257ac35e02be0077.html
pat_moore@pbpost.com
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
By Pat Moore, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 26, 2002
The Florida Supreme Court has refused to review a controversial appeals court ruling that declared an Okeechobee pawnshop negligent for selling a gun to a mildly retarded man three days before he killed an Ohio tourist four years ago.
The decision ended a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the widow of tourist Sonny George Jones against Williams Gun & Pawn, the shop that sold a.38-caliber handgun to Jamie Lofton in November 1998.
"This means people in the gun business have an added liability if they are going to sell a gun to a mentally disturbed person, even if that person is not noticeably weird," Stuart attorney Jack Sobel said.
His client, Nellie Jones, 43, of New Strattsville, Ohio, received the balance of a $275,000 settlement, plus $34,000 in interest, from the pawnshop's insurance carrier after the Supreme Court rejected the case last month, he said.
Scott Mager, the Fort Lauderdale attorney who defended the pawnshop in the lawsuit, argued his clients followed all the legal requirements when selling the gun to Lofton, who filled out the application himself, passed federal background checks and never had been judged mentally incompetent.
Lofton, 29, was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.
The pawnshop's owner and Jones agreed to settle the case for the insurance company's policy limits last year while their attorneys challenged the constitutionality of a Florida law that makes it illegal to sell weapons to anyone under the age of 18 -- or to anyone with "an unsound mind."
Okeechobee Circuit Judge Burton Conner originally ruled that the pawnshop was not liable for Lofton's actions, saying the law was unconstitutionally vague because it does not state how a gun dealer is supposed to determine someone's mental state.
But the 4th District Court of Appeals reversed Conner's ruling and found the law clear, saying Lofton fit the dictionary definition of someone with an unsound mind.
He had a second-grade reading level, attended special education classes for the mentally handicapped in elementary school, never held a job and always lived at home.
Sobel said had the pawnshop owners looked further, they would have discovered Lofton was receiving Social Security disability benefits and had never worked and never was able to get a driver license.
Mager argued the 4th District Court ruling places an unfair burden on gun shop owners to determine a customer's mental capacity.
He said another Okeechobee gun shop refused to sell Lofton a gun a month earlier because it didn't appear Lofton knew what he was doing.
"This means gun dealers will face some added liability if they aren't a little more diligent in screening their customers," Sobel said.
http://www.gopbi.com/partners/pbpost/epaper/editions/today/martin_stlucie_d391257ac35e02be0077.html
pat_moore@pbpost.com
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
cbxjeffIt's too late for me, save yourself.
When Clinton left office they gave him a 21 gun salute. Its a damn shame they all missed....
for discrimination.
"Just my opinion."
There has got to be one standard of liability, and apply it universally.
When you apply the same standard to a much more deadly tool, a car, it sounds absurd.
"If you ain't got pictures, I wasn't there."
Margaret Thatcher
"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
Mark Twain