Date: Tue, 11 Apr 2000 11:30:49 -0700
From: weavert@PRIMENET.COM ("T. Weaver")
Subject: More lawsuit crap
To: AZRKBA@asu.edu
Basically - "Lorcin was responsible for making sure this dead woman knew
that having a gun in her lap when police officers approached could get her
killed if she reached for it".
What shit.
- - -
http://www.inlandempireonline.com/news/stories/040700/guns.shtml
Riverside sues gun maker in Miller slaying
Lorcin, the Mira Loma manufacturer, failed to educate pistol users, the
suit claims.
By Lisa O'Neill Hill and John Welch
The Press-Enterprise
RIVERSIDE
A gun manufacturer shares responsibility for Tyisha Miller's death for
selling the weapon she had on her lap when she was fatally shot by police,
the city of Riverside claims in a lawsuit filed Thursday.
Lorcin Engineering Co. should be named as a co-defendant along with the
city in a wrongful death lawsuit fild by Tyisha Miller's family, said Skip
Miller, the city's attorney. (Join our discussion board on this topic.)
The company is responsible for negligently marketing and distributing the
.38-caliber gun Miller had, the lawsuit contends. Lorcin failed to educate
or train users regarding the safe and correct way to use guns, the suit
states.
"We think they bear significant responsibility," said Skip Miller, who is
not related to Tyisha Miller.
No one associated with Lorcin was available for comment Thursday.
Supporters of Tyisha Miller said the city is trying to shift blame from the
officers who shot her to the gun manufacturer.
"I think what is unfortunate is that they are using a legitimate concern,
that being gun control, to serve an illegitimate purpose, which is damage
control," said Rev. Jesse Wilson, chairman of the Tyisha Miller Steering
Committee.
The city maintains that the shooting was preventable.
"This whole thing would not have occurred but for the presence of this
loaded Lorcin L380," Skip Miler said. "That gun should never have been there.
"The city is not trying to pass the buck. The city has stepped up and taken
full responsibility . . . This whole thing was not entirely caused by the
city."
Riverside Mayor Ron Loveridge said city officials are following Skip
Miller's advice in taking the legal action.
"You try to have the best defense of a case you can and Skip Miller is one
of the best in the business and I support his inclusion of the gun
manufacturer," Loveridge said.
Lorcin, which has been criticized for making uns that sell for less than
$100 each, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in October 1996 with $1.08
million in assets and about $4.2 million in liabilities. Skip Miller said
Thursday the company is not bankrupt.
Bruce Jennings, owner of B.L. Jennings, a gun distribution company, said he
faxed a copy of the lawsuit to James Waldorf, a former Lorcin president and
chief executive officer. Waldorf did not want to comment on the lawsuit,
Jennings said.
The company and several other gun manufacturers have been sued in the past
over allegations that they marketed handguns irresponsibly.
James Waldorf has said that he was forced to close the Mira Loma plant of
Lorcin Engineering in 1999 because of the legal claims. The lawsuits facing
the company were intended to drive up the cost of all guns, he said.
Last month he said the company beat back the claims by governments against
his company.
"Every single claim against Lorcin was dismissed, but at a very expensive
cost of $100,000 here, $100,00 there," in legal fees, Waldorf said.
Waldorf has since started a company in Nevada.
Riverside joins cities across the country that have filed lawsuits against
gun makers. Chicago, New Orleans and Newark, N.J. are among the
municipalities that have taken legal action to recover costs associated
with gun violence.
"This is nothing new, nothing different," Jennings said. "It's exactly the
same allegations of the other 30 lawsuits brought on by cities against gun
manufacturers the past two years that have cost the firearms industry tens
of millions of dollars, if not hundreds of millions of dollars, in attorney
fees."
Thursday's action is the most recent legal maneuvering in connection with
Miller's death and is part of the city's defense against a wrongful-death
lawsuit by Miller's family. Along with the city, two of the officers who
shot Miller and their supervisor are named as plantiffs in the suit against
Lorcin.
Miller, 19, was fatally shot by four white Riverside police officers as she
sat inside a locked, idling car at a Riverside gas station on Dec. 28,
1998. Her friends had called 911 after Miller appeared to be unresponsive
and in need of medical attention.
Officers said they shot the black Rubidoux woman in self-defense after she
reached for the gun on her lap. They were fired from the Police Department
for the tactics they used in the shooting.
Miller did not fire the gun, and investigators later determined that it was
inoperable.
By failing to educate users, "Lorcin proximately caused any andall harm
sustained by Miller and her parents resulting from her tragic death," the
document states.
Lorcin should have known that failure to educate users could subject them
to deadly force resulting in injury or death at the hands of police
officers or others.
Staff writers John Welsh and David Danelski contributed to this report.
Published 4/7/2000