(Houston, TX) Houston attorney Benny Agosto, Jr. of Abraham, Watkins, Nichols, Agosto, Aziz & Stogner has filed a wrongful death and premises liability lawsuit in Harris County, Texas against Brunswick Lakes Homeowners Association, Inc., Prime Site, Incorporated d/b/a Principal Management Group of Houston, and Kraken Holdings, LLC on behalf of the family of Herman Lanaute who was killed on October 10, 2020. Mr. Lanaute, 36 years old, is survived by his wife and children who live in Houston, Texas.
On October 10, 2020, Mr. Lanaute and his five-year-old son visited the Brunswick Lakes community pond, an ungated public area next to the playground located in the community in which their family resides, to operate the son’s remote controlled boat. Shortly after the boat was placed in the water, it stopped operating so Mr. Lanaute entered the water to retrieve the boat which was only a few feet from the shore. When entering the water, he lost his footing, was pulled to the bottom of the pond, and struggled against the water current. The lawsuit alleges that the pump installed for the pond, used to circulate water, was not the correct pump for the pond’s size. As a result of the overpowering force of the pump, Mr. Lanaute was pulled further under the water, where he was sucked to the bottom of the pond and tragically drowned, in front of his son. “What happened to this family is horrific. Imagine a child going into the pond to retrieve a soccer ball that was miskicked. There is no warning that this danger is present and there is a playground adjacent to the pond,” said Mr. Agosto.
Brunswick Lakes, Principal Management, and Kraken Holdings owned and/or operated the Brunswick Lakes property and community area located in Houston, Texas on the date of the incident. The lawsuit asserts allegations against the Defendants for failure to provide warnings of the dangerous condition on the premises, permitting an unreasonably dangerous condition to exist on the premises, and for failure to install the proper water pump and properly maintain the water pump in the pond.
A Temporary Restraining Order was filed on October 23, 2020 and has since been granted by a Harris County District Court judge to preserve any evidence at the pond so that a team of investigators can perform the necessary inspections.
For questions regarding the lawsuit, please contact Benny Agosto, Jr. at [email protected] or Madison Kauffman at [email protected] or 713-222-7211.