Family sues casino nightclubs over college student fatality

The family of the 20-year-old Connecticut College student who died March 7 when a van she was riding in was struck head-on by an alleged drunken driver has sued the Mohegan Sun nightclubs where the driver had been drinking.

Elizabeth Durante, a junior premed student from West Islip, N.Y., was thrown from the van, which was carrying her and other students to Boston's Logan International Airport, where they were to board a flight for a humanitarian mission to Uganda.

Durante's mother, Kathleen Hurley Durante, is bringing the suit against Patrick T. Lyons, permittee of the Ultra 88 and Lucky's Nightclubs, and against the club's financial backers, called Plan B LLC.

The suit does not name the driver, Navy machinist Daniel E. Musser, who is incarcerated on pending manslaughter charges.

"He's uninsured, if I'm not mistaken," said West Hartford attorney John D. Palermo, who is representing the Durante family.

Palermo said the nightclubs violated the dram shop laws by serving alcohol to Musser when he was already intoxicated. State police said Musser, who was stationed at the Naval Submarine Base and lived on Michelle Lane in Groton, was driving a Honda Accord the wrong way on Interstate 395 without headlights turned on.

The dram shop law imposes monetary penalties of up to $250,000 for those who give alcohol to individuals who later cause damage or death.

A representative of the Lyons Group, the Boston-based organization that owns the two nightclubs and several others, declined to comment on the lawsuit.