HOUSTON — This might be the most colorful lawsuit filing in legal history.
A Houston comic book store is suing its next-door neighbor for negligence and mischief. The 24-page legal brief filed by the owners of Third Planet Sci-Fi Superstore includes an 18-page story in comic book form, illustrating its grievances against Crowne Plaza River Oaks hotel and its parent companies, the Houston Chronicle reported.
According to the lawsuit, guests at the hotel have been throwing a variety of heavy items onto the store’s roof, including fire extinguishers, KTRK reported. The offenders have been throwing the items from the hotel’s balconies, the lawsuit alleges. Other missiles allegedly tossed onto the roof include cinder blocks, luggage racks and ceramic mugs, attorney Cris Feldman told the Chronicle.
Third Planet lawsuit tells story of damages, negligence in full-color comic submitted in lawsuit https://t.co/FBtsb8yPRY
— Chron (@chron) July 5, 2021
Feldman said the worst offense occurred in March 2019, when hotel patrons allegedly threw 16 fire extinguishers that punctured Third Planet’s roof. That allowed rainwater to seep into the store, the Chronicle reported.
“They get up on the balconies and it’s like a target, they try to hit a spot and chunk fire extinguishers,” Third Planet owner T.J. Johnson, who opened his business 45 years ago and has been at the same location since 1988, told KTRK. “We have had a lot of merchandise damaged.”
The hotel’s attorneys said the property and its San Diego-based owners are not liable for the actions of its guests, the Chronicle reported. Crowne Plaza argued that it is a matter of criminal mischief, and not a case of the hotel’s neglect.
In order to illustrate the shop’s issues with the hotel, Feldman reached out to Bad Cog Studios to draw a picture of the ordeal, rather than just file a boring legal brief. Feldman said it might be the first time a full comic book has been submitted along with a lawsuit, the Chronicle reported.
Artist Michael Charles of Bad Cog Studios is also a customer of Third Planet. He also has some of his own comics for sale in the store, the newspaper reported.
“I was really intrigued by it because, first of all, I got a lawyer calling me to do a creative project,” Charles told the Chronicle. “So when he approached, I brought it to the boys and they’re like, ‘yeah, we can do that. We’ve never done anything like that, but yeah, we’ll do it, we won’t back down from a challenge.’”
The comic book panels include illustrations of fire hydrants falling through the air, hitting Third Planet’s roof and bursting into flames, KTRK reported.
We see an illustration of hydrants falling through the air. The hydrants hit the roof, with an illustration showing flames. Another frame shows Johnson holding buckets as rain poured in from the damaged ceiling.
”I think it came together perfectly,” Bad Cog artist Michael Brooks told KTRK. “I thought this is kind of different because it has a lot of law lingo and laws embedded in the actual script, which is not how we usually do things.”
Feldman said his legal colleagues have given the comic book positive reviews.
“We obviously didn’t write a lawsuit to create a published comic,” Feldman told the Chronicle. “But, hey man, you just ride the wave.”
Depending on the outcome of the lawsuit, a second edition of the comic book is possible. On the final page of the comic book text is the iconic announcement, “To Be Continued ...!”
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