Lisa Barnes looks to her attorney while in Judge Neil Thomas III’s courtroom during the fifth day of a civil trial in which Lisa Barnes (mother of Hannah Barnes) is suing the Hennen Restaurant Group, alleging that her daughter’s Aug. 22, 2011, death on train tracks nearly the McDonald Farm can be attributed to her consuming alcohol while working at the restaurant hours before. Both Hannah Barnes and Michael Hennen died when a train struck them.
Michael Hennen, 27, and Hannah Barnes, 19Jurors are scheduled to begin deliberations today in a $25 million lawsuit involving the deaths of a local restaurateur’s son and a 19-year-old female employee.
The trial in Hamilton County Circuit Court today enters its eighth day, stretched over three weeks because of court scheduling and winter weather delays.
Lisa Barnes, mother of deceased Hannah Barnes, sued Hennen Restaurant Group, Norfolk Southern Railway and family members of deceased Michael Hennen, 27, son of restaurant owner Tim Hennen.
The trial is against the restaurant group. Court documents indicate the railway is reaching an out-of-court settlement.
Barnes alleges that her daughter drank alcohol at the restaurant in the hours before she and Michael Hennen were struck by a 250-ton train while lying on railroad tracks near McDonald Farm in Sale Creek at 5:50 a.m. on Aug. 22, 2011.