A judge has ordered arbitration of a lawsuit filed by the fellow bartender who accompanied former “General Hospital” actor Johnny Wactor the night he was shot to death as thieves tried to steal his car’s catalytic converter.
The plaintiff is identified only as Jane Doe in the Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit against the owners of the Level 8 bar on Figueroa Street. Doe maintains that the bar owners failed to provide her a safe place to work and park and that they never offered condolences to Wactor’s family or inquired how she was doing, but instead partied at the establishment the next night while the remaining staff waited on them until closing time.
On Thursday, Judge Randolph M. Hammock signed an order sending the case to arbitration and staying the lawsuit pending the outcome. His ruling was based on an agreement by the parties to arbitrate the issues that came about after the bar owners concurred with allowing Doe to remain anonymous during the arbitration proceedings and in the public filings.
The suit identifies Level 8’s owners as Mark and Jonathan Houston, but the suit was filed against their two companies, Level 8 Fig LLC and DTLA Hospitality LLC. In their previous court papers, lawyers for both entities contended that when Doe was hired in July 2023 she agreed in writing to take any individual labor claims she might have before an arbitrator rather than a jury.
The arbitration agreement calls for a neutral arbitrator, is not unfairly weighted toward the defendants and allows for a possible written award to the plaintiff, according to the defense attorneys’ filings.
A post-arbitration status conference is scheduled for Dec. 18, 2026.
In her lawsuit originally filed May 27 and amended on Aug. 26, Doe’s allegations include wrongful constructive termination, breach of oral contract, negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, fraud and deceit, and several state Labor Code violations. She seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages, as well as penalties under the Private Attorneys General Act. PAGA is a California law that allows employees to sue employers on behalf of the state for violations of the Labor Code.
Doe says she was selected for the Level 8 bartending job from among thousands of applicants. About a week after being offered safe parking at the nearby Circa apartment building, she and other employees were told to park in a public facility or on the street, the suit states.
Not long after Level 8 opened in September 2023, a young employee was mugged while walking to her car after a shift, according to the lawsuit. By May 2024, when Doe left her job at Level 8, she had spent $3,000 of her own money on parking and was never reimbursed, the suit states.
After the mugging, management recommended employees begin a buddy system when walking to their cars after work, but didn’t advise on how it should be implemented, according to the lawsuit.
Wactor, 37, was shot about 3:30 a.m. on May 25, 2024, while walking with Doe toward his parked car near Hope Street and Pico Boulevard. Of the four men arrested in connection with Wactor’s killing, two have been sentenced for lesser crimes while two others await trial on murder and other charges.
Wactor appeared on nearly 200 episodes of “General Hospital” from 2020-22. His other credits included “Westworld,” “The OA,” “NCIS,” “Station 19,” “Criminal Minds” and “Hollywood Girl.”