The stately Royal Melbourne Hotel has been exonerated in a court case where a patron sued the pub and an assailant for injuries sustained in an altercation.
Around 10pm on 30 May 2018, Rene Van Rullen was in the venue with a friend and work colleague, Daniel Howes, at a table beside Peter Sheppard, who was also with a friend.
In facts agreed, Howes approached the other table and began singing ‘You’ve Lost that Lovin’ Feeling’. Some “interaction” between the groups followed, ending when Sheppard shoved Van Rullen, causing him to fall over, suffering a broken kneecap and torn ligament.
The injuries required surgery, and complications resulted in a deep-vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism.
Van Rullen filed a case against both the Royal Melbourne Hotel and Sheppard, seeking $200,000 in damages.
In the recent hearing, Van Rullen attested that he was not drunk, but conceded his singing companion was affected by alcohol.
He submitted that Sheppard had consumed a large quantity of alcohol at the Hotel, was ‘increasingly loud and boisterous’ and ‘argumentative and aggressive’, and was behaving inappropriately with women.
He argued Sheppard should have been denied entry due to signs of drunkenness, also that staff should have denied him service or asked him to leave, and that they should have intervened in the disturbance and thus prevented the assault.
Sheppard testified he had come to the Hotel with a friend in the early evening. The pair had reportedly consumed ‘about seven or eight pints’ before arriving, having drunk beers at the Mitre Tavern since midday.
He stated he was in a somewhat animated conversation with his mate, and under cross-examination conceded he appeared on the CCTV footage to be “getting aggressive” with his companion.
He admitted to being drunk and assaulting Van Rullen, but argued the pub should be held partly liable.
In its defence the Hotel denied it had breached its duty of care to patrons, and suggested the assault was not reasonably foreseeable in the circumstances.
Judge Julie Clayton presided at Victorian County Court, and handing down her verdict noted Van Rullen had succeeded in his claim against Sheppard and that “quantum has been agreed”.
Clayton acknowledged that the Hotel did owe Van Rullen a duty of care, but iterated there was no evidence Sheppard had shown obvious signs of being too drunk to enter.
Referring to the footage of the night, Clayton denied Sheppard’s rate of drinking was sufficient to raise any red flag with staff, nor did his behaviour warrant attention, stating that the video did not support a conclusion the defendant had become increasingly intoxicated.
The judge was “not persuaded” that staff monitoring Sheppard while he was in the hotel would have “reasonably” been able to identify he was inebriated.
“To detect the earlier momentary signs of intoxication, such as slight unsteadiness, would require a degree of surveillance that would impose too high a duty on the hotel,” adjudicated Clayton.
It was found that only Sheppard was liable for the “unexpected assault” and the claim against the Hotel was dismissed.
Owner of the Royal Melbourne, Nick Grigoriadis, told PubTIC he was extremely glad to get the favourable result, after more than five years.
“I think we all try to do right thing, but unfortunately sometimes people take their own initiative without coming to management,” he said of the incident.
“If they had talked to our managers at the time, it definitely would not have escalated the way it did.”
Full ruling of the Victorian County Court.
