Can Walmart or Costco check your receipt?

*Disclaimer* the post is not intended to slam Walmart in any way

In this article, a man who went to Walmart to buy an XBOX is tackled for failing to show his receipt an employee. Is he able to sue Walmart for the injuries that he suffered, and embarrassment of being called a thief? Is it legal for them to ask to show your receipt?

We don't know what state this incident took, however state laws are generally in agreement over this matter. A store can detain you whenever they want while your in their store, the question is whether they have a defense this imprisonment. In my home state of Washington the law is RCW 4.24.220, and it states that a store's employees may detain a person if they have grounds to suspect them of shoplifting. However some stores have policies in place that forbid the employees doing anything to stop shoplifters. They do this to protect themselves from lawsuits, as its cheaper to loose a couple of hundred dollars of stuff, then to be sued. For example, a man died of a heart attack in a Walmart after being tackled by loss prevention officers and a customer. If his family sues, the first hour of the lawyers time will cost more then the $300 worth of stuff he was trying to steal

But what about stores like Cosco and Sams Club? To be able to purchase stuff at those stores you have to have a membership, and when you sign that contract, it says that you agree to have your receipt checked as you leave the store. A regular store can only make you show a receipt when you leave if they have a suspicion that you've shoplifted something. They can't make you show the receipt if you don't want to.

Now that we know that Walmart had no business checking this guys receipt, can he sue them for his injuries from being tackled? He could sue, however its unlikely that he would be able get anything, as he was tackled by customers of the stores, not the employees of the store.

Kitsap County Fair

Towards the end of August we spent the week at the fair

You can get some really great macro shots with a reversed lens, and flash.


watchin the slack roping


I guess I ain't going to be ropin that one...


Gotta love that shirt


gettin closer...


and done, almost


not bad, for a John Deere


and don't forget it


how does this thing work?


a face only a mother could love


step one, swing the loop


step two, catch the calf


and step three, jump off the horse and catch the calf

Products Liability

I was reading RSS feed when I came across this article

Which says, in short, that the company that makes the Louisville Slugger should pay for the death of a kid, who was hit in the head with a baseball. The ball had been hit off of a aluminum baseball bat that was manufactured by Louisville Slugger. We can all agree that it is a tragedy that 18 year old Brandon Patch was killed, however should the company that manufactured that bat be held liable for his death?

When people sue each other in Torts, there is an area called Products Liability, which states that a manufacturer or distributor of a defective product can be held liable for the harm that it causes to the consumer. In this case the it was argued that the bat was defective in its warning to the consumer. It may be true that the manufacturer failed to warn of the dangers of the bat. However it is required that if they had put a warning on the bat, that it would have stopped the harm that happened.

The real question is, if Brandon had read the warning label on a bat that he did not own, and was not using, would he still been harmed? The answer is no, as a baseball player understands that there are risks associated with the sport of baseball. And those risks include being hit by a flying baseball. In law they call this assumption of the risk, a person can't sue for a injury that he or she knew they could suffer. However it has to be proven that the person injured assumed the exact harm that happened. So, did Brandon assume the risk of being hit in the face with a baseball? That is a question for the jury to decide, and as one of my professors says “Try a 100 different cases, get a 100 different verdicts”.

This case is one of the few examples where common sense and the law are in agreement, in that this court came to the wrong conclusion. There are many who say that cases like this are the reason that would should drastically reform the the judicial system. However I think this case shows the reason we need lawyers who have character, not just a drive for money.