Legal Question in Business Law in California

Re: Car Theft from Mall Parking Lot

This deals with a third party being held responsible for the criminal acts of another. I handled a case similar in Wise v. Sup. Ct. There the extranged husband of Mrs. Wise went on a shooting spree injuring several others then killed himself. The plaintiffs wanted to hold the wife responsible. The Court of Appeals ruled that absent a special relationship between the victims and the third party (Mrs. Wise) there was no liablity. This consistent with the rape cases brought against the Board of Regents where co-eds have been raped on campus by other students. I do not think you have a very strong case.

Re: Car Theft from Mall Parking Lot

To recover against the mall or the security company, you (or your son) would have to plead and prove that the other side was negligent. Negligence requires that a duty to you existed and the duty was breached, resulting in harm to you. No mall security system is likely to be 100% effective, so even in the absence of negligence some theft may occur. Unless you know of some specific fact such as the guard on duty that night was passed out drunk in his patrol car, you can't establish breach of a duty.

Further, you would have to establish that you were owed a duty in the first place. Many shopping centers don't provide security guards either because they are small, don't have a history of problems, or both. Unless you prove that the mall owed you a duty to provide guards because of a high incidence of crime, you don't even get to talk about whether that duty was breached.

I doubt any attorney would take the case on contingency and unless you have strong facts I think it is not worth pursuing at your own risk and expense.