CHARLESTON — The New Boondocks bar and its owner face a lawsuit in the shooting death of a young father.
Brandi Chandler, the administrator of the estate of Jamaine Sutton, filed a complaint in Kanawha Circuit Court against Capital City Dynasty, which operates The New Boondocks, and Todd Nelson Miller, the owner of the nightclub.
According to the complaint, Sutton visited the bar on May 14, 2016 to socialize when friends when gunfire broke out. Sutton, 32, was near a door, but it was locked. Sutton was shot five times by a patron aiming at someone else. He died at the scene.
Jack Dolance
| Dolance Law
Sutton was unarmed and was not a responsible party in the violence that caused his death.
The lawsuit alleges the bar owner failed to have adequate security safeguards in place at his nightclub despite more than 100 calls placed to 911 about violence at the club in the prior year. In addition, the complaint states, Miller allowed patrons to enter without a pat down in exchange for paying a higher cover fee into the club.
Chandler is seeking compensatory and punitive damages. She is represented by Jack Dolance of Dolance Law Office.
"A young man was killed and he didn't need to be," Dolance told the West Virginia Record. "We want this business owner to know a life was lost and that others were affected by those actions. He was a young father and now he's gone."
Dolance said the violence in the bar that night was not the first incident there.
"This business now won't accept responsibility," Dolance said.
The case is assigned to Circuit Judge Charles E. King.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number: 18-C-637