Tennessee Injury Law Center
Super Bowl Sunday is almost here. Whether you are an Eagles fan, a Chiefs fan or you are just excited about the dips and commercials, if you are hosting a party, do you know legal responsibilities if you are serving alcohol? What about if your dog bites someone at the party? What about if your buffalo chicken dip gives everyone food poisoning? Read on to learn how Tennessee law handles some of these questions.
What are your obligations if someone at your party becomes too intoxicated to drive home safely?
Legally, if a person over the age of 21 drinks too much at your party and then gets in a wreck on the way home and injures him or herself or someone else, you do not have any liability under Tennessee law. The law considers you a “social host” and social hosts are not liable if a person over the age of 21 drinks too much alcohol and causes a car accident.
However, the law is different if the person is under the legal drinking age of 21. If you permit an underage person to drink at your party, regardless of whether you furnished the alcohol, you could be held legally liable for any harm caused by that person.
Of course, there is a difference between legal responsibilities and moral obligations. If someone at your party drinks too much, help them get home safely or invite them to stay on your couch or in a guest room, whether you have any legal responsibility or not.
Are you legally to blame if someone gets food poisoning at your party?
If you catered your party and the food was tainted, the liability rests with the caterer unless you failed to follow proper food safety, such as leaving the shrimp dip made with mayonnaise out too long without an ice bed, etc. However, if you made your famous Mississippi Sin Dip with expired cream cheese thinking it would be OK, you could be held responsible for food poisoning if someone is sickened by it. As a practical matter, the food poisoning would have to be severe requiring hospitalization, etc. before most lawyers would accept such a case. A mild case of food poisoning is unlikely to present any legal threat. One final point: your homeowner’s insurance would almost certainly cover any such claim if one was filed.
Can you be sued if your dog bites someone at the party?
We have written extensively about legal responsibility for dog bites and dog attacks, and you can read more about your obligations here and here. The best advice is that if you have a dog that is aggressive, unpredictable, temperamental or just old and grouchy, put the dog up for the party for your protection and that of your guests, especially if young children will be in attendance.
If a guest is hurt at my party, am I responsible?
A party host is liable to a guest injured on their property if the party host created the hazard that caused the injury or knew or should have known of the hazard that caused the injury. Let us give you a few examples. If you know the legs on one of your kitchen chairs are wobbly and need repairs, put that chair up so that it does not collapse when someone sits in it. Likewise, if you know your front porch step is rotten, put up a sign and rope it off and asks guest to come through the garage or back door. For hazards like these that you know about, you must warn your guests or take reasonable steps to prevent injury, or you could be found responsible if someone is hurt. On the other hand, if a party guest spills a drink on the floor and someone falls because of it, you are unlikely to be responsible because you did not create the spill. Liability would only be likely if the spill remained on the floor for a long period of time without you cleaning it up.
One final note on this topic: if some of your guests will be young children, take adequate steps to child-proof your home. Make sure medications are out of reach, put dishwasher pods out of reach, lock up any weapons, etc. These are not necessarily hazards for adults, but they are for young children.
That was a lot of information, and we are not trying to make you cancel your Super Bowl party. The main point is that you should take reasonable steps to protect your guests. In most situations, your homeowner’s policy will handle any claim or lawsuit, but nobody wants to wake up on Monday with guilt and regret because a preventable accident at the party caused someone to be seriously injured.
As always, we are here if you need us.