A Golden Corral franchisee on Tuesday reached a settlement with the widow of a man who died after he tripped over a chair leg at a restaurant in Newnan, Georgia, ending the dispute shortly after a jury was seated for trial.

Attorneys for Metro Corral Partners LLC, Barbara Connell and the estate of Teddy Connell completed the voir dire process to select a jury, only to announce shortly after lunch they had reached an agreement that would end the case that previously was revived by the Eleventh Circuit.

"I am glad you've resolved it on your own," U.S. District Judge Steven Grimberg told the parties. And to the jurors, the judge said he was grateful for their "great service," even if it was cut short.

The settlement, details of which are to be submitted to the court within 21 days, come just over eight years after Teddy Connell and his family visited a Golden Corral restaurant in Newnan in May 2017. Court records indicate Teddy Connell was walking back from the buffet when he clipped his foot on the bottom of a chair leg at an unoccupied table. He fell and fractured his right femur, requiring surgery, then died later that month, at the age of 85.

Teddy Connell's surviving spouse, Barbara Connell, and Gregory Scott Williams, executor of Teddy Connell's estate, sued Metro in April 2019, alleging it violated its duty to keep the premises of its restaurant safe by, among other things, selecting chairs with protruding back legs and arranging tables and chairs with inadequate aisle space and unsafe passageways for patrons.

According to Barbara Connell and Williams, the chair Teddy Connell tripped over was designed with a "wall-saver" feature that caused its back legs to curve outward, extending the base of the legs beyond the chairback to prevent the back of the chair from hitting a wall. But, they said, the chair he tripped on did not back into a wall at all.

The case was eventually removed to federal court, and Metro moved for summary judgment, contending that there was no evidence of a dangerous condition in the restaurant at the time of the fall, that any dangerous condition that might've existed was neither open nor obvious and that Teddy Connell would've known about the chairs as he had passed the area where the chair was located at least once before he fell.

Metro's motion was granted, prompting Barbara Connell and Williams to ask the Eleventh Circuit to review the case.

The appellate court vacated the lower court's ruling in June 2024, finding that genuine issues of material fact remained for a jury.

Among other things, the Eleventh Circuit said the district court got it wrong when it found there was no evidence that Metro had "actual or constructive knowledge" that the chairs were a hazard. That is incorrect, the panel said, based on the deposition testimony of Metro's vice president of operations, who confirmed numerous prior trip-and-fall incidents involving the same chairs at other Golden Corral locations.

The appellate panel also said that while the district court agreed with Metro that recovery was barred because Teddy Connell had been around the chair before the fall and would've had knowledge of any potential hazard, that ruling was incorrect. The evidence for that was not "plain, palpable and undisputed," the panel said, especially because his view of the floor was "likely obstructed" by food he was carrying back from the buffet.

"That Teddy previously had walked by the chair on which he tripped and other identical chairs does not, without more, demand a finding that he had knowledge of the chairs' protruding back legs," the Eleventh Circuit said. "Walking near a hazard is different than 'successfully negotiating' it, and there is no evidence showing how near or far Teddy previously walked to the chair he later tripped on. So we cannot conclude that it is undisputed that Teddy had successfully negotiated the chair's back legs."

Records show that Williams succumbed to illness in 2023, at which point Michael H. Hill was appointed successor executor by the Coweta County Probate Court. Hill joined the instant case as a plaintiff at that time.

Barbara Connell and the estate are represented by Vincent R. Lauria of Vincent R. Lauria Esq. and Darren W. Penn, John David Hadden and Kevin M. Ketner of Penn Law LLC.

Metro Corral Partners LLC is represented by Jerald Robert Hanks, John Wallace Campbell and Nnenna Theresa Opara of Hanks Law Group LLC and W. Jason Pettus of McAngus Goudelock & Courie LLC.

The case is Connell et al. v. Metro Corral Partners LLC, case number 1:19-cv-02710, in the U.S.District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.