Walmart Evades Suit of Customer Hit by Shoplifter Getaway Driver

Walmart Inc. can’t be held liable for a thief’s getaway driver hitting a customer in the store parking lot, an appeals court ruled in a win for retailers in Florida seeking to deter shoplifting.

Walmart and other retailers don’t automatically expand their “zone of risk"—the area in which they’re liable for the health and safety of customers—beyond the confines of a store by confronting shoplifters on the sidewalk, a divided Fifth District Court of Appeals ruled Friday. And even if retailers have internal polices limiting how employees interact with thieves, that doesn’t mean having such a policy—or a worker breaking ...