Did you know that a jury once awarded sportscaster Erin Andrews $55 million because of what a hotel allowed a stranger to do? In September 2008, Andrews was staying at the Nashville Marriott at Vanderbilt University while covering a college football game. A stalker, Michael David Barrett, got hotel staff to confirm that she was staying there, requested and received the room adjoining hers, altered the peephole in her door, and secretly filmed her in her room. The video was posted online in July 2009 and viewed millions of times. Barrett pleaded guilty to interstate stalking in December 2009 and was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison. The civil case that followed became the textbook example of hotel negligence.

Andrews sued in Davidson County Circuit Court in Tennessee (case No. 11C4831), seeking $75 million. The defendants who went to trial were Barrett and the two companies behind the hotel: West End Hotel Partners, which owned it, and Windsor Capital Group, which operated it. Marriott International itself was dismissed before trial. On March 7, 2016, the jury returned its verdict: $55 million.

What did the hotel do wrong?

The criminal act was Barrett’s. The negligence case was about the doors the hotel opened for him. The evidence showed three basic failures. First, staff confirmed to a stranger that a named guest was staying at the hotel — the very information a stalker needs. Second, the hotel honored his request for the room adjoining hers with no safeguards and no notice to the guest next door. Third, the hotel had no meaningful guest-privacy policy governing any of this. That promise of safety includes protecting who is staying there, and where.

Why did the jury put 49 percent on the hotel?

Tennessee, like many states, asks a jury to divide fault among the people and companies responsible for the harm. That division in this case ran only between the defendants. The jury assigned Barrett 51 percent of the fault — about $28 million of the verdict. It assigned the hotel owner and operator 49 percent — about $27 million. This was not a finding that Andrews did anything wrong; she bore no fault at all. The man who committed the crime bore slightly more responsibility than the companies whose failures made it possible — and their share alone was worth $27 million.

Why a $55 million verdict is not a $55 million recovery

Here is the lesson this case teaches every injury client. A verdict is a jury’s number. A recovery is what a plaintiff actually collects, and the two are often far apart. About six weeks after the verdict, in April 2016, Andrews and the hotel defendants settled the case on confidential terms. No amount has ever been disclosed. And Barrett’s $28 million share was, as a practical matter, uncollectible: he had no assets to pay it. Lawyers call a defendant like that judgment-proof. So the famous $55 million headline was never the amount anyone wrote a check for — which is why experienced lawyers discuss collectability, insurance and settlement value from the first meeting, not just what a jury might award.

What did the case change?

Hotels across the country rewrote their guest-privacy practices because of this verdict. Guest names, presence and room numbers are now treated as confidential information that staff do not confirm to callers or visitors. Requests for a specific room next to a specific guest draw scrutiny instead of automatic approval. Privacy and security training for front-desk staff became standard. Jurors in the case said they intended the award to make hotels do better — and, by that measure, it worked.

The legal principle is not unique to Tennessee. Hotels and other properties owe their guests and visitors a duty of reasonable care, and that is true in Florida as well: when a foreseeable crime or injury happens because a property failed to take reasonable security and privacy measures, Florida law treats that as negligent security — core personal injury work. A business does not have to commit the crime to share responsibility for it. It only has to make the crime easier than it should have been.

This article is general information about the legal system, not legal advice for a specific case. This was not a Tacher Law case. Tacher Law offers a free consultation on injury and wrongful-death matters. Call +1 (305) 644-2211. “We make friends by accident.”

Sources (reporting checked November 3, 2026):