Jury Awards $3.15 Million After Elderly Woman Fractures Hip in Darkened AMC Theater

On an evening at an AMC movie theater in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, a woman in her late 70s made her way into a darkened auditorium to find a seat. The aisle was poorly lit, the handrails did not meet code requirements, and the conditions violated AMC's own internal safety policies. She tripped and fell, fracturing her hip. The injuries were severe and permanent.

The case, captioned Hozey v. American Multi-Cinema Inc., proceeded to trial in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas before Judge Sean Kennedy. AMC argued the woman bore some responsibility for her own fall. The jury rejected that defense entirely.

Franklin Strokoff of The Rothenberg Law Firm presented evidence that AMC had breached the Pennsylvania Building Code and ignored its own protocols for auditorium lighting and handrail installation. Strokoff also showed that AMC did not photograph the area where the fall occurred until three days after the incident, a delay the jury evidently weighed in evaluating the company's conduct.

After five days of trial, the jury returned a verdict of $3,146,500 and assigned 100 percent of the fault to AMC. No comparative negligence was attributed to the plaintiff. The verdict ranked among the top reported premises liability verdicts in Pennsylvania in 2020.

The Legal Intelligencer reported the verdict on January 30, 2020, crediting The Rothenberg Law Firm as counsel for the injured woman.