Stokes

Filed 12/19/24 Certified for Publication 1/10/25 (order attached)

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SIXTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

BROOKE STOKES et al., H050639 (Santa Clara County Plaintiffs and Appellants, Super. Ct. No. 19CV357748)

v.

FORTY NINERS STADIUM

MANAGEMENT CO., LLC, et al.,

Defendants and Respondents.

Late in the afternoon on October 7, 2018, while leaving a San Francisco Forty Niners (49ers) football game, Mark Stokes was severely injured in the Santa Clara Levi’s Stadium (Stadium) parking lot after being punched twice in the face by another fan, defendant David Gonzales (Gonzales). The incident ensued after Stokes kicked a glass bottle that struck Gonzales’s car. Stokes was rendered unconscious, sustained a brain injury, and never worked again. He passed away in March 2021 after suffering a severe asthma attack which his family alleged would not have been fatal but for his prior head trauma. Gonzales was charged with a felony. He pleaded no contest to assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury (Pen. Code, § 245, subd. (a)(4)), and he was sentenced to…