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GUARD COMPANY HIT WITH 46 MILLION DOLLAR AWARD  


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Ken
    What's your take on this one. See article below my response
A.J. DeMarzo
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Response
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    If you're in the alarm business it's hard to see how this guard company could be found civilly liable for failure to provide security protection under the facts as reported in the article.  We don't have a lot of information, however, such as whether there is a written guard contract, what it states and more importantly, how was this case handled by defense counsel.  We probably shouldn't assume mismanagement just because the defense team lost the case, and lost it miserably.  Some how the defense team was unable to convince the jury that guards, unarmed, paid close to minimum wage, are not on duty to risk their lives and prevent injury to others; that their sole responsibility is to notify the police, which according to the article they did.  
    What can alarm and security companies learn from this terrible story and horrible results?  Use a proper written contract.  Had this guard company used the Standard Form Stationary Guard contract I am confident the case would have been won. even if tried by the lamest insurance company defense team.  How did this guard company allow itself to create the expectation to the workers and to the jury that its unarmed guards would have put themselves in harms way to avert this terrible incident.  How could the defense team not been able to convey this message.  Hard to predict the appeal since we don't have the record transcript of the trial, but I wish the defense team much success on the appeal.
    Thanks to AJ for sending this to me for comment.
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reported by NBC news:
    A jury awarded over $46 million in damages to the families of two women who were shot and killed by a disgruntled employee at the Kraft Foods plant in Northeast Philadelphia in 2010.
    A jury last month found U.S. Security Associates, Inc. (USSA) of Georgia negligent in the deaths of Tanya Wilson, 47, and LaTonya Brown, 36, and awarded their families $8.02 million in compensatory damages. On Wednesday, a jury then awarded the families $38.5 million in punitive damages, bringing the total to more than $46.5 million.
    Wilson and Brown were killed in 2010 after Yvonne Hiller, a third employee at Kraft, was suspended from her job and returned shortly after armed with a .357 magnum. Hiller also shot and injured a third co-worker.  Hiller was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and is serving life in prison.
    A lawsuit was filed against USSA stating two security guards failed to protect the people at the Kraft plant during the shooting. A supervisor was instead caught on surveillance video running and hiding in a boiler room, according to the lawsuit.
    The lawsuit also accuses the guards, who were unarmed at the time, of failing to warn employees in the plant in the several minutes it took Hiller to walk to a third floor mixing room where Wilson and Brown worked. The guards called 911 but didn't take any additional actions such as contacting Kraft management, using a radio to communicate with the employees or sounding a warning through the plant's public address system, according to the lawsuit.
    “The verdict is an important message to U.S. Security that their guards can’t simply run away in the middle of a crisis," said Shanin Specter, of Kline & Specter, P.C., who represented the Wilson and Brown families along with Dominic Guerrini and Patrick Fitzgerald. "They actually have to act like security guards." 

A spokeswoman from USSA released the following statement on the verdict:
    U.S. Security Associates believes that its personnel on duty on the night of the North Philadelphia shooting made reasonable decisions and acted with courage in the face of a direct threat to their own lives. In no sense did they or USSA display an intentional disregard for the safety of others. We are disappointed in today’s verdict and intend to appeal on the grounds that  the evidence presented was not sufficient for a punitive damages award to be granted under well-established Pennsylvania law.
At the same time, the people of USSA sympathize deeply with the families of Tanya Renee Wilson and LaTonya Sharon Brown, the two women who died in the shooting, and with Bryant Dalton, who was severely wounded.