Scenes from La Trattoria in Naples after partial ceiling collapse
La Trattoria on Fifth Avenue South in Naples remained cordoned off Monday after part of the restaurant’s ceiling collapsed Sunday night.
A customer has sued a downtown Naples restaurant, claiming he was injured when the ceiling collapsed earlier this summer.
The man was injured at La Trattoria on July 28 at about 6:45 p.m. when the ceiling partially collapsed at the restaurant, 878 Fifth Ave. S. Police helped evacuate the building and surrounding area and closed Fifth Avenue South between Ninth Street South and Eighth Street South.
Seven of the nine people who suffered non-life-threatening injuries were taken to nearby hospitals.
What we know about the lawsuit
Joseph Lentine, 63, of Plantation is seeking more than $50,000 in damages from the owners of La Trattoria on Fifth Avenue South in Naples. Lentine claims in the civil suit that he suffered “severe, permanent and persistent injuries.”
On July 28, 2024, Lentine “went to the restaurant La Trattoria for Sunday dinner, expecting a quiet and relaxing evening to end the weekend.”
Miami-based attorney Aaron P. Davis, who filed the lawsuit in Collier County District Court on August 21, said his client suffered significant traumatic brain injury and was “barely able to cope with daily life.”
Grace’s Places of Naples, the building’s landlord, and the restaurant are named as defendants in the lawsuit. La Trattoria part-owner Massi Tonni declined to comment by phone. Tonni was listed in court records as the defendant’s registered agent.
What injuries did the plaintiff allege in the lawsuit
Lentine “left La Trattoria restaurant in an ambulance – seriously injured and bleeding – after the building’s ceiling collapsed during Sunday dinner,” the lawsuit states.
“Wooden posts, beams and other ceiling materials rained down on the restaurant patrons below, and numerous people, including Lentine, went into a frenzy as they tried to seek shelter from the sudden barrage of fire.”
As a result, Lentine alleged in the lawsuit, he has suffered “past and future serious bodily injury and resulting pain and suffering, disability, disfigurement, mental anguish, aggravation and/or acceleration of pre-existing medical conditions, loss of ability to enjoy life, expenses for hospitalization, medical and nursing care and treatment, loss of earnings and loss of ability to earn money.”
“The losses are either permanent or ongoing in nature and Lentine will continue to suffer the losses in the future.”
Lentine, who was in Naples visiting a friend, said in a telephone interview that he had been “beaten up” and had suffered a cut on the middle finger of his left hand that required seven stitches.
He said there was “a bit of screaming,” he passed out and then went outside.
“I remember sitting down and someone handing me a napkin to wrap my finger because it was bleeding and hurting,” Lentine said. “I didn’t even know my head was bleeding.”
Now, when he enters a restaurant or other building, he says, he looks up even nearly a month later, adding, “It was traumatic for me and I’m slowly recovering, but it was a lot.”
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What the plaintiff claimed La Trattoria had failed to do
The lawsuit, which is requesting a jury trial, alleges that La Trattoria was negligent by allowing “defective ceiling conditions. This includes, but is not limited to, failure to maintain the structural integrity of areas within” the restaurant.
Davis, who noted that he had represented a client who sued following the 2021 collapse of the 12-story Champlain Towers South building that killed 98 people in Surfside, said the La Trattoria incident was “gross negligence.”
“The fact that this happened is unbelievable,” Davis said. “It’s hard to believe that in 2024, you could be stuck ordering pasta and the ceiling would fall on your head.”
Dave Osborn is the regional editor of the Naples Daily News and News-Press. Follow him on Instagram and threads @lacrossewriter and on X @NDN_dosborn.
