Bowling alley sued in vehicular homicide case

Complaint says Lucky 66 Bowl overserved alcohol to a patron before accident

A local bowling alley is named in a wrongful death lawsuit that alleges the establishment overserved a woman who, shortly after leaving, struck and killed a pedestrian, according to court documents.

The driver, Vi-Nhat Nguyen is charged with vehicular homicide, but Bernalillo County deputies said in a criminal complaint that her blood alcohol level was within the legal range. Nguyen left the scene, but called police dispatch after she arrived at her home to report that she’d hit something on Fourth Street, according to the complaint.

She told deputies that she and a friend had dinner together around 6 p.m. and each had a beer before moving to Lucky 66 Bowl, where she had two more beers while bowling. As she drove home, “something hit her vehicle,” but she did not feel safe stopping in the area and continued home, according to the complaint. Nguyen, who is also charged with leaving the scene of a crash, is not named in the civil suit, but Lucky 66 Bowl is. Her attorney, Ousama Rasheed, declined to comment on the civil case.

The wrongful death lawsuit was filed Jan. 30 in state District Court by Britania McNab, whose fiance, Edward Lloyd, was hit by Nguyen’s Lexus while walking in his Los Ranchos neighborhood, according to the complaint. Lloyd later died in a local hospital.

By serving Nguyen, the lawsuit argues, Lucky 66 Bowl “negligently created a dangerous condition” and it was “reasonably foreseeable” that serving Nguyen “posed an unreasonable risk of harm to members of the public.”

The bowling alley failed to properly hire, train and supervise its employees, and did not adequately design or enforce procedures for selling alcohol, the lawsuit alleges.

Lucky 66 Bowl did not respond to requests for comment.

McNab’s attorney Kimberly Brusuelas said it is “pretty clear” that Nguyen was overserved. Deputies said Nguyen performed poorly on field sobriety tests before she was taken to a substation for a breath test. It is not clear from court documents how much time elapsed between the collision and the breath test.

Brusuelas said many establishments don’t put into place systems to combat overserving. She said servers, dependent on tips, may feel like they have to keep pouring for patrons who are already intoxicated in order to make enough money to survive.

“If you overserve,” Brusuelas said, “you’ll make enough money at this low-wage job.”

The New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department says that anyone who sells or serves alcohol within the state is required to obtain a permit by taking a server education class.

McNab is seeking monetary and punitive damages.