Inset: Saiy-Yah Allen (Royal Funeral Service, Inc.).
A jury in Florida awarded $2.7 million to the family of a 9-year-old boy who died years after hitting his head on a metal cart in Walmart, in a verdict that was severely reduced after jurors found that the megastore was only partially at fault for the conditions that led to the boy’s death.
The tragic incident involved Saiy-Yah Allen, a 9-year-old who died after a two-and-a-half-year battle with traumatic brain injuries and post-traumatic seizures that were the result of injuries sustained at a Walmart store in Ft. Lauderdale on Nov. 25, 2020.
Following Saiy-Yah’s death, his family filed a wrongful-death lawsuit alleging that Walmart’s negligence in maintaining safe store conditions and breaking its own safety rules directly led to the child’s untimely death. Court documents state the then-7-year-old boy walked into the handle of a metal stock cart that was jutting into an aisle, striking his head first on the handle, and again on the floor.
The jury awarded Saiy-Yah’s estate a total of $9 million but determined that Walmart was only 30% responsible for the boy’s injuries, resulting in the $2.7 million award.
A spokesperson for Leeder Law, the firm that represented the family, told Law&Crime that each of Saiy-Yah’s parents was also found to be 30% responsible for his injuries while his estate was found to be 10% at fault.
“This verdict is a bittersweet victory. Nothing can bring back this beloved child and talented artist. Saiy-Yah loved to draw and create art with pride and precision and this decision affirms that his life had immeasurable value,” attorney Thomas H. Leeder said in a statement. “Walmart’s negligence stole a future filled with incredible promise of a young artist. We hope this verdict serves as a wake-up call to corporations everywhere: prioritize safety and following its own safety rules or face the consequences.”
As Law&Crime previously reported, Saiy-Yah’s sister testified at trial about her brother’s seizures in the years after the incident.
“He would shake a lot and he would look in a different direction, and then he would shake and make noise, too,” Miharah Allen said. “Every time he ate, he would throw up, he would throw the food up or use the bathroom on himself.”
The company said in court documents the boy “failed to use his senses” and was not looking where he was going when he walked into the cart.
“Walmart is not liable for the incident as the stock cart was so open and obvious that [Saiy-Yah] should have been reasonably expected to discover it and protect himself (by simply walking around it), and a stock cart is so obvious and not inherently dangerous that it can be said, as a matter of law, not to constitute a dangerous condition that will not give rise to liability due to the failure to maintain the premises in a reasonably safe condition,” the defendant’s motion for summary judgment said. “Here, unfortunately, [Saiy-Yah] was inattentive and failed to walk around a stock cart’s handles that were observed by his sister, who was not walking with her head turned. [Saiy-Yah] failed to use his senses and was walking while looking backward, therefore he did not observe the open, obvious, and innocuous stock cart.”
Following the verdict, Walmart issued the following statement to Law&Crime:
“We empathize with any family dealing with loss. The jury found the majority of the fault did not lie with Walmart. Under current Florida law, Walmart would not have any financial responsibility for the judgement. We are awaiting a decision on a directed verdict and considering all of our post-trial options.”
The Walmart spokesperson appears to be referring to Florida’s new system of comparative fault, which was modified when the state last year passed a law barring plaintiffs in negligence lawsuits from recovering damages if they are found to be more than 50% at fault for their own injuries.
The Leeder Law spokesperson clarified to Law&Crime that in addition to Saiy-Yah’s estate being only 10% at fault, the new statute did not apply to his case “because this lawsuit was filed before the tort reform occurred.”
Law&Crime’s Jason Kandel contributed to this report.
