As an associate attorney in the firm’s Casualty Department, Adam concentrates his practice on general liability litigation and also includes automobile liability, trucking & transportation, construction injury, rideshare liability and product liability. He defends corporations, organizations, and their employees in contract and tort matters, including workplace and construction accidents, motor vehicle claims, and wrongful death actions.
Adam earned his J.D., magna cum laude, from Cleveland State University College of Law, where he served as Executive Editor of the Cleveland State Law Review and participated in the Entrepreneurial Law Organization and the Entertainment and Sports Law Association. He also gained probate experience through an internship at a boutique firm, drafting wills, trusts, and memoranda on a range of estate-related issues.
Before law school, Adam completed his Bachelor of Arts in political science, with a minor in philosophy, at The Ohio State University. During his undergraduate years, he contributed to the Do Good Be Great Organization, helping raise funds for cancer research.
Adam first joined Marshall Dennehey in February 2024 as a law clerk in the Cleveland office, later advancing into the firm’s summer law clerk program before transitioning to his current associate role. In addition to his professional work, Adam is actively involved in community service across Ohio, volunteering with the Center of Hope Food Pantry, Eastwoods Elementary School as a classroom assistant, and the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank.
Thought Leadership
Case Law Alerts
Dead End for Plaintiff: No Duty, No Vicarious Liability, No Causation in Ohio Premises Liability Ruling
November 3, 2026
Carol Quinlan-Hall was injured when the headstone marking her father's grave fell on her while she and her husband were visiting the gravesite at Sts. Peter and Paul Cemetery Association ("SPPCA"). She sued SPPCA and Carl Slusher, the cemetery's sexton, alleging he had negligently repaired a tilt in the headstone years earlier and that this repair was the cause of the eventual collapse. Slusher denied it, testifying that he was never made aware of any issue with the stone or its foundation and never performed repair work for an individual plot holder, since plot holders were required to purchase their own headstones and arrange installation through third-party vendors. SPPCA's bylaws confirmed this division: the sexton's duties covered general grounds upkeep and placing headstone foundations, but were silent on repairing or installing the stones themselves. The trial court granted summary judgment for the defense on three grounds, and the First District affirmed. On duty, the court held SPPCA owed no duty to Hall because it neither owned nor controlled the headstone, had no actual or constructive notice of any hazardous condition, and faced no history of similar incidents to make the harm foreseeable. This reinforces that a cemetery's—or, more broadly, any property owner's—duty tracks the scope of what it actually owns or controls; a family-purchased monument installed by outside vendors falls outside that scope even though it sits on the owner's land. On respondeat superior, the court rejected vicarious liability against SPPCA even assuming Slusher had done the alleged repair, because that work fell outside the duties the bylaws actually assigned him and mere on-site presence or opportunity was not enough. On causation, the court found the claim too speculative to survive summary judgment. Hall herself testified the tilt was corrected after the alleged repair and stayed corrected for somewhere between two and five years, with no observed defect during frequent visits in between. Citing Ohio's rule that a negligence claim cannot rest on conjecture, the court held that bridging a multi-year gap between an alleged negligent act and the injury was too speculative to reach a jury. The case is notable less for breaking new ground than for stacking three independent, generally-applicable defenses—no duty/no notice, no respondeat superior, and no causation—any one of which alone would have been dispositive. That makes it a useful all-purpose citation for insurers and defense counsel facing negligence claims built on attenuated, long-past conduct, whether or not a cemetery is involved.
Case Law Alerts
Barking Up the Wrong Tree? How the Supreme Court of Ohio Shortened the Leash on Landlord Liability for Statutory Dog-Bite Claims
July 20, 2026
In a recent 5-2 decision, the Supreme Court of Ohio addressed whether the owner of a manufactured-home community that permits leashed dogs in common areas is a “harborer” of a dog under R.C. 955.28(B), Ohio’s dog-bite statute, which imposes strict liability on the “owner, keeper, or harborer of a dog” for injuries it causes, subject to limited exceptions. The case arose after a child was bitten in the face by a tenant’s dog while playing on a playground within the defendant’s community. The plaintiff alleged that the community owner was a “harborer” of the dog that bit him and, therefore, strictly liable for his injuries. Although the Second District Court of Appeals agreed, the Supreme Court of Ohio accepted the case to determine the meaning of “harborer” under the statute. Applying its plain and ordinary meaning, the Court held that to “harbor” a dog means to shelter, protect, or exercise control over it. While Ohio’s courts of appeals have long described a harborer as someone who has possession and control of the premises where the dog lives and silently acquiesces to its presence, the Court clarified that mere acquiescence is not enough; to harbor a dog requires one to actively shelter, protect, or exercise control over it. Because Sun did not shelter, protect, or exercise control over the tenant’s dog, the Court concluded it was not a harborer of it. This decision significantly changes how statutory dog-bite claims against landlords and other property owners will be analyzed. Specifically, rather than focusing on who controls the premises where the dog is kept, courts must now focus on who controls the dog itself. As a result, it will be considerably more difficult to classify landlords as harborers under R.C. 955.28(B). Importantly, the decision does not eliminate a property owner’s liability for common-law negligence claims. Property owners may still face liability if, for example, they knew of a dog’s repeated aggressive behavior or ignored lease violations. The decision narrows only one avenue of recovery. Landlords should still enforce their pet policies, document complaints, and respond to reports of dangerous animals. Nonetheless, for landlords and their insurers, this opinion provides a meaningful new defense against statutory dog-bite claims. Ownership or maintenance of common areas, standing alone, no longer automatically exposes a property owner to strict liability for injuries caused by a tenant’s dog. Plaintiffs will need stronger evidence that the defendant actively sheltered, protected, or exercised control over the dog that caused the injury.
