Cinemark Dropped Its Claim Against Aurora Shooting Victims
After the movie theater shooting in an Aurora, Colorado theater in 2012, a group of the victims got together to sue the theater chain Cinemark for not doing enough to prevent such an incident from occurring. They claimed that security flaws in the theater prevented employees from stopping someone carrying weapons onto the premises. This past May, a judge sided with Cinemark against the victims, claiming that the chain had no way of knowing about the shooter beforehand, and Cinemark was then legally able to recoup costs from the victims, which it fixed at $700,000. Now, the chain is finally dropping the claim, effectively ending the suit.
According to The Denver Post, earlier in September, Cinemark reached an agreement with all but four of the plaintiffs to drop the suit entirely, and all the plaintiffs had to do was not pursue an appeal. Today, the remaining four agreed not to appeal, Cinemark did away with its legal fees claim, and the case was officially ended.
Cinemark’s lawyers said in a statement:
“All plaintiffs in this matter have now waived appeal of the jury’s verdict and the case can now be deemed completely over. Defendants’ goal has always been to resolve this matter fully and completely without an award of costs of any kind to any party.”
A federal lawsuit was also filed against Cinemark by a few of the victims, which was dismissed by a judge. Two of the shooting victims who were paralyzed during the attack are still pursuing an appeal for that case, and Cinemark has until September 20 to say whether it wants them to pay legal fees.