Family of woman, grandson slain at Publix files wrongful death lawsuit against grocery chain

More than a year after a 69-year-old Royal Palm Beach woman and her nearly 2-year-old grandson were gunned down by a mentally disturbed man in Publix, their grieving family on Wednesday sued the grocery giant, claiming it could have prevented the tragedy.

Disputing the notion that the June 2021 deaths of Litha Varone and her grandson, Samuel, were simply random acts of violence, the family said that the chain had plenty of warning that its customers were at risk.

“Publix ignored every red flag that placed the safety of their customers in jeopardy,” the Varone family said in a statement. “They ignored the need to invest in security and that choice cost us everything.”

Their attorney, Sean Domnick, put it more bluntly.

The Lakeland-based chain, which earned $4.5 billion in 2021 from the 832 stores it operates throughout the Southeast, put profits ahead of customer safety, he said.

“There’s technology available for places like Publix if they cared about protecting their customers and their employees,” Domnick said.

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Instead, he said, the chain, which touts its family-friendly stores as being “where shopping is a pleasure,” didn’t have security guards in place to protect shoppers from gun violence that has become increasingly common in supermarkets.

While security cameras were posted in the store, they were used mainly to thwart shoplifters and weren’t monitored, Domnick said.

“They were all about protecting their investment in the things they are selling, but they weren’t interested in protecting their customers,” he said.

Providing security would have been “a drop in the bucket” for the bottom line of the privately held company, he said. “This isn’t some mom-and-pop operation,” he added.

A spokesperson for Publix, which publicly offered condolences to the Varone family after the shooting, said it would be "inappropriate" for the company to comment on a pending lawsuit.

Lawsuit alleges security lapses at Publix let gunman carry out threat

In the lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County Circuit Court, Domnick said the security lapses emboldened Timothy Wall to carry through with online threats he made to kill children.

Security cameras showed that the unemployed carpenter, who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, first entered the store in The Crossroads shopping plaza on Royal Palm Beach Boulevard shortly before 9 a.m.

Wearing a mask that was then required for COVID-19, the 55-year-old Wall carried a golf club and a duffle bag as he wandered through the aisles. He left at about 9:06 a.m. after making a small purchase.

Roughly 2½ hours later, as the store filled with lunchtime shoppers, Wall returned. He found Varone and her son in the produce section. He pulled a semi-automatic handgun out of the duffle bag and shot Samuel, who was sitting in a shopping cart.

Litha Varone attempted to wrest the gun away. During the scuffle, she fell to the floor. Wall shot her and then turned the gun on himself.

Domnick described Wall’s first visit to the store as a reconnaissance mission. Wall wanted to find out what, if any, obstacles would be in his way if he decided to carry out his plan to kill people.

When Wall realized there were no security guards and no one was curious about why he was carrying a golf club and a duffle bag, his path was clear, Domnick said.

“He knew that would give him the opportunity to do what he wanted to do,” the attorney said.

'Zone of risk': Should incidents nearby have led to more Publix security?

With the chilling regularity of mass shootings, such lawsuits have become common across the country. The owners of the Pulse nightclub in Orlando are being sued for failing to prevent the 2016 attack that killed 49 people and injured 53 others. Kroger and other retailers have also faced legal action in connection with shootings.

But, attorney Val Rodriguez said, such lawsuits are difficult to win. Domnick must be able to prove that Publix ignored obvious warning signs that the store had become a dangerous place, said Rodriguez, who has successfully defended sports bars against similar claims.

In the lawsuit, Domnick lists an array of crimes that occurred near the Royal Palm Beach Publix in the three years before Varone and her grandson were killed. In addition to vandalism, drug buys and bike thefts, he lists one instance where a person brandished a gun and another where a person threatened to shoot sheriff’s deputies. Both incidents occurred in the parking lot.

Legally, the “zone of risk” that a retailer is responsible to keep safe is limited to the store itself, Rodriguez said. It typically can’t be held responsible for crimes that occurred in the parking lot, which often is controlled by the owner of the plaza.

The consequences of holding retailers responsible for crimes that occur outside their doors would be enormous, Rodriguez said.

“That would mean that every single business in the area would have a duty to hire a security guard — the beauty shop, the Chick-fil-A, the apartment complex, everyone,” Rodriguez said. “That zone would be gigantic.”

However, Domnick said, the crimes in the parking lot showed a pattern and should have alerted Publix to beef up security.

Further, he said, it should have been aware of research that shows that grocery stores have increasingly become targets for mass shootings.

Hundreds of gun violence incidents at grocery stores since 2000, lawsuit says

From January 2000 to mid-May 2022, there were 448 incidents of gun violence at 12 national grocery chains and 137 people were killed, according to figures Domnick plucked from the Gun Violence Archive. Publix was the scene of 16 shooting incidents where a total of five people died.

Other chains, even Publix at some of its locations, hire security guards, he said.

“If Publix had security in place to identify people who are potential threats then it easily would have identified Wall as a potential threat earlier,” he said. The deaths of Varone and her grandson could have been avoided.

He said he didn’t know how much he would be seeking for Samuel’s parents, Daniel and Melissa Varone, or Litha Varone’s children, Daniel, David and Sandra Varone.

In the statement, the family said nothing will help them recover from the loss of Samuel and his grandmother, who played a crucial role in the lives of her children and grandchildren.

“There is no path that will ever take away the crushing grief that has engulfed our family,” they said. "Nothing can ever take away the profound sense of emptiness in our hearts, but there is a path that may prevent another family from experiencing this type of anguish.”

Jane Musgrave covers federal and civil courts and occasionally ventures into criminal trials in state court. Contact her at jmusgrave@pbpost.com.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Lawsuit targets Publix after woman, grandson slain at Florida store