Lonnie and Sandy Phillips, parents of Auora theater shooting victim Jessica Ghawi, filed a lawsuit in 2014 against four gun companies. A judge dismissed their claim and ordered them to pay $203, 000 in attorney fees. (Denver Post file)
Re: “Family of Jessica Ghawi, Aurora theater shooting victim, stuck with legal fees,” Oct. 4 Perspective article.
While my heartfelt condolences go out to the parents and friends of Jessica Ghawi and the friends and relatives of all of the victims of the Aurora theater shooting, Michael Sainato’s anti-NRA article is grossly misdirected.
Any competent lawyer knows that it was inevitable that Ghawi’s parents would end up owing lawyer’s fees to the manufacturers because of the state and federal immunity laws enacted to prevent just such lawsuits.
But Ghawi’s parents made the decision to file a lawsuit that they knew would fail anyway, and the companies they wrongfully harmed deserve to be compensated for this vexatious action.
They are victims of the killer and their entirely understandable inconsolable sorrow and rage. But they are not victims of the NRA, gun manufacturers, or the law-abiding gun-owning public.
Their lawyers should have declined to file the case.
Scott Weiser, Monument
Surely there is nothing more painful that having a child murdered, and most of us have great sympathy for the parents of Jessica Ghawi. I do, however, question the wisdom of their decision to sue the companies that sold the guns to the shooter. My husband often told me, “Itap possible to sue anyone for anything.” It is possible to sue, but that does not mean the plaintiff will win the lawsuit. How would it be possible for a merchant to be responsible for what a customer does with the merchandise? If I were to slice my finger with a kitchen knife, should the department store where I bought it have to pay for my medical bill? We can and do argue about appropriate gun laws, but this case was properly dismissed.
Irene Eggers, Wheat Ridge
This letter was published in the Oct. 11 edition.
