Los Angeles Dodgers Ordered to Pay Beaten Fan More Than $100,000

The Los Angeles Dodgers must pay $108,500 to a fan who was beaten by security after his friend argued with another fan about a spilled drink, a Los Angeles jury ruled Wednesday.

Daniel Antunez will receive compensation for medical expenses, lost wages, and pain and suffering, according to a minute order describing the verdict from the Los Angeles County Superior Court jury. The jury found the baseball team was negligent and falsely imprisoned Antunez, and did not order the team to pay punitive damages. The case is the latest in a string of excessive violence lawsuits against the baseball team’s stadium security over the past decade.

Antunez’s attorney, Peter diDonato, previously won $100,000 in punitive damages from the Dodgers after a 2023 jury trial in Los Angeles County Superior Court for a different fan who alleged excessive force from officers at the stadium.

While at a Dodgers game to celebrate Antunez’s birthday in 2018, Antunez’s friend Vanessa Gonzales spilled a drink on a fan in the row in front of her, according to Antunez’s opening brief. The fan’s wife was upset, and later, Gonzales and the woman started arguing near the bathrooms.

When security told Gonzales she would have to leave, Antunez walked toward a nearby bathroom, and multiple security officers threw him to the floor. Antunez fractured his ankle and needed a wheelchair to leave the stadium.

Antunez was put in handcuffs by Dodgers security, despite not being charged with a crime, his second amended complaint said. He has since had three surgeries on the ankle, according to his brief.

The Dodgers argued the force was necessary, saying in their opening brief that after a security guard grabbed Antunez on his way to the bathroom, Antunez punched him, and the other officers came to the first guard’s defense.

The security guard grabbed Antunez because he was headed toward a bathroom near the fan who complained about the spilled drink, their brief said.

diDonato, a Santa Clarita-based attorney, has filed more than fifteen suits against the Dodgers since 2018, largely involving law enforcement and security guards at games. The Dodgers drew four new suits from diDonato in August, in which fans alleged the team’s security guards assaulted, battered, falsely imprisoned, and committed civil rights violations against them.

The leader of Dodgers security said during the trial that the security division does not look into its own uses of force, diDonato told Bloomberg Law Thursday. “Shuffling off” investigations to risk management, human resources, and attorneys is a way to shake accountability and avoid addressing problems, diDonato said.

The Dodgers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

diDonato Law Center represents Antunez. Jerome M. Jackson and Long & Levit LLP represents the Dodgers.

The case is Antunez v. Los Angeles Dodgers LLC, Cal. Super. Ct., No. 19STCV13057, 2/28/24.