Say it ain't so: Potential end to Walmart overnighting...

[peteg59]

It has finally happened where someone is suing WM for allowing overnight camping in their parking lots.
A truly greusome story but how it is Walmart's fault for the horrific incident is beyond comprehension, IMO.

Sisters asleep in minivan burned alive in parking lot fire. Now mom is suing Walmart​

Mitchell Willetts
Thu, August 11, 2022 at 1:15 PM


A Minnesota mother is suing Walmart after a fire in a store parking lot burned her daughters alive, killing one and leaving the other “permanently disfigured,” according to a lawsuit.
Essie McKenzie’s daughters were sleeping soundly in the back of her minivan when she pulled up to the Walmart Supercenter in Fridley, Minnesota, on Aug. 6, 2019.
The girls, ages 6 and 9, were tired after being woken early to go to the airport, where McKenzie dropped off her mother, she would later tell investigators, according to court documents. She decided to let them sleep while she took care of some shopping, believing they would be safe.
It was around 6 a.m.

When she came back outside minutes later, the minivan was in flames, documents say.

Full story here: https://www.yahoo.com/news/sisters-asleep-minivan-burned-alive-171500335.html

 

[user 423]

^Oh great. Leave your kids alone in a Walmart parking lot. Some people are just terminally stupid and sadly they aren't necessarily the ones who suffer the consequences.

 

[barefootrebel]

The fire started in another vehicle, caught her minivan on fire, and the first responders were already there when she came out?

Walmart has parking lot cameras. Would be interesting to know exactly how long a time span she was inside.

Horrible that the children had to pay the price.

 

[Ron Scott]

This happened on August 6, 2019, over three years ago.

 

[Carla618]

that whole story sounds like bullshit.

Law enforcement determined that a California couple was traveling through the state in their 2005 Dodge Caravan, which they were using as a portable, temporary travel home. The night before, the couple had slept in the Caravan in the Walmart parking lot, and the next morning, used a portable cook stove to make breakfast. However, they put the stove back in the vehicle afterward before it had completely cooled off, then drove the Caravan closer to the front of the lot, parking next to McKenzie’s vehicle, and the man — Roberto Hipolito — then went into the store.

McKenzie’s lawsuit says she and her daughters had dropped off her mother and another family member at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport that morning for an early flight, then came to the Walmart to pick up some items. Her daughters were sleeping so McKenzie decided to let them continue sleeping in the vehicle while she shopped at Walmart.

About two minutes after Hipolito went inside the store, a passerby alerted Hipolito’s wife — who was in the front of the Caravan — that the vehicle had caught fire. That fire then spread to the nearby cars, including McKenzie’s while her daughters were still inside.

Hipolito pleaded guilty to negligent fire as part of a plea deal and was sentenced in August 2020 to three years of probation with a stayed four-month prison term.

In the lawsuit, McKenzie says Walmart’s policy, which allows overnight camping in its parking lots, along with its failure to monitor the camping areas and conform to state and local ordinances for camping “has created real hazards and thereby endangered the safety and health of those who shop and work in the store or live nearby.” It adds that the “unregulated, unlicensed, and unmonitored campgrounds pose a threat of illness, injury, noise, and crime to a considerable number of members of the public.”

The lawsuit also cites several state and local statutes for camping that it alleges Walmart violates by allowing campers in its lots and failing to supervise those campers. It adds that Walmart’s negligence “escalated the danger to create a foreseeable risk that Mr. Hipolito would use and store a cook stove negligently and thereby cause harm to others.”

More: https://kstp.com/kstp-news/local-ne...hat-killed-1-daughter-seriously-hurt-another/

It is also in the Miami Herald: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article264410476.html

 

[Morgana]

The fire was caused by a camper who handled his camp stove carelessly.
Carelessly enough to do jail time for it.
So yes, there is a real and obvious camping connection.

Whether that makes Walmart liable is arguable (dubious imo), but it's not a ridiculous or outrageous claim.

If there's a moral to this story at all, it's about campers using the privilege of camping at Walmart (or anywhere!) responsibly.

And it has absolutely bleep $%^& all to do with clergy sexual abuse of minors (though the poster who suggested it did might win some kind of prize for the long-jump for getting their pet peeve into a totally unrelated thread).

 

[Carla618]

And it has absolutely bleep $%^& all to do with clergy sexual abuse of minors (though the poster who suggested it did might win some kind of prize for the long-jump for getting their pet peeve into a totally unrelated thread).

Thanks Morgana, I assumed the OP and others hadn't found the actual (original) article, based on their comments. So I looked it up. Now I can see that all the info was there from the start=/

 

[Carla618]

I don't blame the parents in this case. If Walmart is going to allow camping, then rules should be in place. Camping safety rules. Because Walmart failed to do so, we may lose the privilege for good. (Campgrounds don't allow campers to park a few feet apart.)

However, not posting rules may be what saves Walmart in this court case.

 

[Morgana]

Walmart must have a gazillion lawyers. I doubt they made the choice to open up their parking lots to campers without imagining situations like this and calculating their legal exposure.

It's not black and white -- you allow people onto your property, they do weird stuff, someone gets hurt, at what point does that become your responsibility? We can all imagine situations that are obviously "yes" or obviously "no" but there's a lot of grey area in the middle. I imagine Walmart's gazillion lawyers have given a lot of thought to that. I hope they set it up well enough that this lawsuit won't be a threat to the whole policy.

Some of the coolest places I've visited kind of make you think "this is a lawsuit waiting to happen" -- a walking trail with lots of alligators in Florida -- a not-fenced-off plantation ruin in the Virgin Islands -- (sigh) long may they last without some moron spoiling them.

And I still think the main takeaway from this story is practice fire safety whether you're at Walmart or in the back of beyond!

 

[Morgana]

And the next guy could have a meth lab or decaying dynamite in his van and it blows up, it doesn't have to have anything to do with camping.

 

[user 423]

I don't blame the parents in this case. If Walmart is going to allow camping, then rules should be in place. Camping safety rules. Because Walmart failed to do so, we may lose the privilege for good. (Campgrounds don't allow campers to park a few feet apart.)

However, not posting rules may be what saves Walmart in this court case.

But WM doesn't really allow 'camping'. They just allow people to park overnight. I can't see why they would be held responsible for what some idiot does with a stove. It was a total fluke out of the 100's of thousands of times people overnight at WM's each year.

There are probably many other accidents that could happen in a parking lot that could bring harm to a couple of kids left alone. A large truck popping out of gear and rolling away and crushing them. A car left running with the A/C on overheating and bursting into flames. A gas tank exploding after someone has drilled a hole into it to steal the gas. Etc.etc. All flukes not likely to happen and also not preventable by WM.

 

[peteg59]

This happened on August 6, 2019, over three years ago.

The lawsuit was more recent, making the topic of overnighting in a WM parking lot a current potential issue for nomads and other travelers using these lots to overnight in.
Hopefully they won't pull the plug nationally, on their generous policy...

 

[NctryBen]

leaving kids in the car in the first place for any amount of time is far more the issue to me. Walmart is being asked to fix stupid? Then you have a guy putting a stove away hot. Stupid plus stupid is still stupid. Can’t see how this would effect the staying overnight thing. Just more rules in doing so maybe. Most of the laws, rules or otherwise placed on us are the result of people’s stupidity and misuse of freedoms.

 

[maki2]

I don't blame the parents in this case. If Walmart is going to allow camping, then rules should be in place. Camping safety rules. Because Walmart failed to do so, we may lose the privilege for good. (Campgrounds don't allow campers to park a few feet apart.)

However, not posting rules may be what saves Walmart in this court case.

She left young children alone in her vehicle while they were asleep when she went inside to do shopping. That is the underlying illegal action. She is to blame,

Should Walmart put up signs saying do not leave your children in your vehicle without an adult to supervise them while you shop?

 

[RvNaut]

It has finally happened where someone is suing WM for allowing overnight camping in their parking lots.
A truly greusome story but how it is Walmart's fault for the horrific incident is beyond comprehension, IMO.

Please... stop over reacting and doing the "SKY IS FALLING" thing..... if anything comes of this, it will be a long time, and.. why would Wlamart be responsible for a car burning up.... it is a stupid law suit and will get thrown out...

This is a non-story.

 

[peteg59]

Please... stop over reacting and doing the "SKY IS FALLING" thing..... if anything comes of this, it will be a long time, and.. why would Wlamart be responsible for a car burning up.... it is a stupid law suit and will get thrown out...

This is a non-story.

While I agree with you on the frivolity and likely dismissal of the lawsuit, the resources that Walmart will need to expend in putting it to rest is likely significant.
As a result, it is also likely their generous allowance of their parking lots to travelers overnighting will be curtailed, if not totally shut down once the dust settles on this.
Many Walmarts already have stopped allowing overnighters in their busier urban locations.

Not sure how the "SKY IS FALLING" can be interpreted in putting the story out for others to see?
But every written and spoken word gets over analyzed on a regular basis on the internet nowadays...

 

[Frood]

I don't blame the parents in this case. If Walmart is going to allow camping, then rules should be in place. Camping safety rules. Because Walmart failed to do so, we may lose the privilege for good. (Campgrounds don't allow campers to park a few feet apart.)

However, not posting rules may be what saves Walmart in this court case.

It seems like it's about 95% the fault of the idiot who put a hot stove away incorrectly and started a fire with 5% of the fault remaining with the parent who made the choice to leave their kids alone and unsupervised in the parking lot while they went shopping... But blaming WalMart (parking lot owner)? If this happened on BLM land would the BLM be responsible because camping is allowed on BLM land? I can only see two parties that are at fault here... the parent for leaving their kids alone, asleep, and unattended in a parking lot and the camper for being murderously stupid. They weren't even 'camping' any more, but rather they had moved their vehicle and were going shopping. The could just as easily cooked their food at the Cracker Barrel next door and driven to WalMart. Would Cracker Barrel be responsible in that case?

Maybe this area is a special case but from what I have seen you are allowed to stay overnight in the parking lot, not to set up camp. If you cook in your vehicle, this isn't camping. It's someone cooking in their vehicle which they could do in pretty much any parking lot anywhere.

 

[user 423]

I remember in 2014 staying at the Missoula WM when a 70yo guy got beat up by panhandlers who were squatting there. He lost an eye and sued WM but I can't seem to find anything on the outcome. They probably settled and carried on as normal.

 

[JeepLiving]

1. I hate Walmart.
2. I never park overnight in Walmart parking lots.
3. I hope Walmart can get this frivolous lawsuit dismissed early on.
4. I hope Walmart continues to allow overnight parking.

 

[user 423]

1. I hate Walmart.
2. I never park overnight in Walmart parking lots.

So where do you overnight while travelling?