MGM Resorts International shifted into damage control mode last week in the form of an open letter to employees from Chairman and CEO James Murren explaining why the gaming giant is suing victims of last October’s mass shooting.
Murren apologized for not informing employees before word of the lawsuits made the news and at the same time decried media coverage of the company’s action as “misleading and truly awful”.
“I know the way things have been portrayed has left many feeling confused, hurt and disappointed. I am very sorry for that and I am grateful to have this opportunity to clarify.”
He then echoed the company’s initial response from two weeks ago, saying, “To be perfectly clear, MGM Resorts is not suing victims for damages or attempting to extract monetary payment from the victims in any way.”
What it is doing is seeking the most economical means to deflect liability for the massacre, which occurred the night of October 1 when a gunman who’d stockpiled an arsenal of automatic and semi-automatic weapons in a suite atop MGM’s Mandalay Bay hotel opened fire on an outdoor music festival, killing 58 and wounding more than 500 before taking his own life.
With more than 2,500 victims, family members or loved ones suing the company or threatening to in a multitude of state jurisdictions, MGM’s aim is to consolidate the cases in federal court where it plans to claim immunity from liability under a law known as the SAFETY Act, which Congress passed in the aftermath of 9/11 to protect private businesses victimized by acts of terrorism. MGM’s argument is that because the company hired to provide security for the festival is off the hook by virtue of a SAFETY Act designation from the Department of Homeland Security, MGM, as the contractor, should be, too. The company is suing in eight states on these grounds, naming more than 1,000 shooting victims or their loved ones as defendants.
The public outcry has included tearful responses from several victims at a press conference in California and a “#BoycottMGM” backlash on social media.
MGM maintains that is acting in the best interests of the victims.
“Unfortunately, resolving these cases currently requires a prolonged litigation process across multiple courts in multiple states lasting many, many years,” Murren’s letter states. “If these cases proceed in this manner, victims, which include MGM Resorts employees and families, first responders and witnesses would face the need to testify over and over again, traveling throughout various courtrooms across the U.S. in trial after trial. That scenario would place an unnecessary and painful burden on all of those affected.”
“They want to get it all over at once,” said David Levine, a law professor at the University of California Hastings College of Law in San Francisco. “They don’t want to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars litigating over and over again on many battlefields.”
Which, he added, may make sense for MGM economically. But it’s also without precedent.
“In a personal injury situation, you let the plaintiffs go first. They get to pick the time and place of the lawsuits initially. White goes first in a chess game, red goes first in a checkers game— that’s the idea.”
Levine said that while he expects the victims will be hard-pressed to prove MGM and Mandalay Bay should have anticipated and prevented the shooting, he also expects MGM will fail to win the federal jurisdiction it seeks.
“The issues on the merits need to be assessed in the lawsuits filed by the plaintiffs, not at a time and place of the choosing of the hotel defendant.“
