Tiger Woods and his girlfriend Erica Herman
BY AAGD STAFF
(May 13, 2019) According to a lawsuit, a former employee of Tiger Wood’s restaurant, The Woods, died in a fatal crash on Dec. 10, 2018 due to drunkenness. The blood-alcohol level of24-year-old Nicholas Immesberger, a bartender, was more than three times the legal limit.
Immesberger’s parents are blaming the athlete, his girlfriend Erica Herman and their employees at “The Woods” restaurant for the December drunk-driving crash that killed the man, says NBCNews.com.
The wrongful death lawsuit was filed Monday in circuit court in Palm Beach County, Florida, and it claims that even though restaurant employees, managers and owners of the popular Jupiter, Fla., venue knew that Immesberger was an alcoholic, they plied him with drinks after his Dec. 10, 2018, work shift.
After leaving the facility that night, Immesberger died in a deadly crash while heading to his home on December 10 near the community of Port Salerno — about 20 miles from The Woods Jupiter restaurant and bar.
They “not only ignored Immesberger’s disease, they fueled it by over-serving him alcohol to the point of severe intoxication and then sending him out to his car,” the suit claims.
As Woods prepares for this week’s PGA Championship, he issued an apology to the family of Immesberger, saying that he feels bad for the family, according to CNN.com. “We’re all very sad that Nick passed away,” Woods said ahead of this week’s PGA Championship. “It was a terrible night, a terrible ending, and we feel bad for him and his entire family. It’s very sad.”
The wrongful death lawsuit targets Woods, who owns the restaurant where Immesberger worked, and Woods’ girlfriend Erica Herman, who is listed in the complaint as the general manager of the business.
On Monday, a lawyer and representative for Tiger Woods was asked to comment on the lawsuit but did not immediately respond to requests.
The lawsuit claims that Immesberger had a blood-alcohol level of .256, more than three times the legal limit, after leaving The Woods restaurant a around 6 p.m., afterward he crashed his Corvette and died.
The restaurant’s general manager — Woods’ girlfriend, Erica Herman — had recruited Immesberger to work as a bartender, the suit says. She and Woods had “direct knowledge” of Immesberger’s drinking problem, the suit claims, though it does not provide additional details.
The suite also alleges that despite this, they were drinking with Immesberger at The Woods bar only a few nights before the fatal crash.”
The suit states that The Woods promoted drinking and encouraged employees to do so on the job. Before the deadly crash, the suit says, friends and relatives had repeatedly driven Immesberger home because he’d been “served so much alcohol that he was unable to function properly.”
A close friend of Immesberger’s warned workers to stop serving Immesberger, who a month before his death had crashed another car after heavy drinking, the suit says.
The suit, filed by Mary Katherine Belowsky and Scott Duchene, alleges that Herman and Woods are liable for knowingly serving an alcoholic.
The lawsuit comes just weeks after the 43-year-old golfer completed one of the greatest comebacks in sports history, winning The Masters after a lost decade of sex scandal, back injuries and drug addiction. President Donald Trump honored Woods with the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House last week.
