## Facts

- John V. Stachniewicz was injured during a barroom fight at a drinking establishment operated by Mar-Cam Corporation.
- Plaintiff’s group sat at a table next to a booth occupied by customers who had been drinking at the bar for about two and one-half hours.
- A dispute began when a member of plaintiff’s party refused to let an intoxicated patron from the booth dance with his wife.
- The booth occupants made hostile, threatening remarks toward plaintiff’s group.
- A member of plaintiff’s party complained to the bartender; the bartender responded, “Don’t start trouble with those guys.”
- Shortly after, individuals from the booth approached plaintiff’s table and struck someone, triggering a broader brawl.
- When someone shouted “Fuzz!”, the booth group ran out of the bar; plaintiff was later found injured near the door and suffered retrograde amnesia.
- No witness could identify the specific moment or mechanism by which plaintiff sustained the head injuries.
- Plaintiff claimed defendant’s conduct violated (1) an Oregon statute forbidding furnishing alcohol to a visibly intoxicated person and (2) an OLCC regulation requiring licensees to prevent disorderly conduct and not allow visibly intoxicated persons to remain.
- The trial court refused to treat the alleged violations as negligence as a matter of law and the jury returned a defense verdict.

## Issues

1. Whether violation of ORS 471.410(3) (prohibiting furnishing alcohol to a visibly intoxicated person) constituted negligence as a matter of law toward an injured patron.
2. Whether violation of OLCC Regulation 10-065(2) (requiring licensees to prevent disorderly conduct and not allow visibly intoxicated persons to remain) constituted negligence as a matter of law toward other patrons injured in a barroom fight.
3. Whether the evidence permitted a reasonable inference of causation linking any regulatory violation to plaintiff’s injuries despite uncertainty about the precise injuring blow.

## Decision

- The Oregon Supreme Court reversed and remanded for a new trial.
- Violation of ORS 471.410(3) was not treated as negligence as a matter of law on these facts because causation between furnishing additional alcohol after visible intoxication and the injury was too speculative.
- Violation of OLCC Regulation 10-065(2), if proved, constituted negligence as a matter of law because the regulation was directed at preventing barroom disturbances and related injuries to patrons.
- The evidence was sufficient for a jury to infer that defendant permitted visibly intoxicated and disorderly conduct to continue and that this failure could have caused plaintiff’s injuries, even without proof of the precise injuring act.
- The trial court erred by effectively withholding the regulatory negligence-per-se theory from the jury.

## Legal Principles

- A statute or regulation supplies the standard of care (negligence as a matter of law) when (1) the plaintiff is within the class the enactment was intended to protect and (2) the harm is the type the enactment was intended to prevent.
- Not every statutory violation supports negligence per se; the enactment must bear a sufficiently direct causal relationship to the injury alleged.
- Liquor control regulations aimed at preventing disorderly conduct and excluding visibly intoxicated persons can establish negligence per se when an innocent patron is injured in a disturbance the regulation sought to prevent.
- Causation may be proved by reasonable inferences from the circumstances; inability to identify the exact injuring blow does not necessarily remove causation from the jury when the injury occurs during the risk the regulation addresses.

## Conclusion

The court held that alleged violation of a liquor control regulation requiring a bar to prevent disorderly conduct and remove visibly intoxicated patrons could constitute negligence as a matter of law toward an injured patron, and that the case should have been submitted to the jury on that theory; the defense judgment was reversed and the case remanded for a new trial.


Stachniewicz v. Mar-Cam Corp., 488 P.2d 436 (Or. 1971)