PHILADELPHIA, PA, October 06, 2025 /24-7PressRelease/ -- A federal wrongful-death lawsuit filed by Friedman Schuman Layser PC attorneys Brett J. Kaminsky and Katherine Lekh alleges that Philadelphia-based Aramark employees ignored 37-year-old U.S. citizen Zachary Graff for more than 15 hours during a medical emergency in a hospital in China, leading to his tragic and preventable death.
"This case is about systemic neglect that starts at Aramark's headquarters, right here in Philadelphia," said Brett J. Kaminsky of Friedman Schuman Layser PC. "Aramark failed to ensure adequate staffing, training and oversight, and those failures cost a young man his life."
The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, claims that at least 10 Aramark employees saw Graff in clear medical distress on May 7, 2023. The filing states that staff cleaned around him, walked past him, talked to him while unresponsive, and ultimately locked him on the fourth floor of the hospital overnight. Despite multiple Aramark employees coming into contact with Zachary during this 15-hour time period, not one alerted medical personnel to check on him.
According to the suit, Graff visited a clinic inside Gulou Hospital, a facility that contracted with Philadelphia-based Aramark to provide cleaning and security services in Nanjing, to fill a prescription for chronic knee pain. After taking the medication around 10:30 a.m., he began staggering as he walked through the facility and sat in a chair near an escalator on the hospital's fourth floor, where he remained unresponsive and breathing abnormally for hours.
Fifteen hours worth of security footage reviewed by the family shows Aramark employees walking past Graff repeatedly, cleaning around him and attempting to engage him; one security guard told him to "stop sleeping" on three occasions, while another Aramark employee picked up his phone charger that had fallen to the floor, according to the complaint. The filing alleges the floor was later locked and the lights turned off with Graff still inside. When his wife arrived around 11 p.m., she had been unable to reach Zachary for hours. Aramark security initially refused her entry, and only granted access after she involved the police and they reviewed the surveillance video. She found him at about 2:15 a.m. unconscious and barely alive. Only after pleading with the Aramark security guards did they call for medical assistance. At 2:28 a.m., medical assistance arrived but were unable to resuscitate Zachary. He was pronounced dead at 2:48 a.m.
The lawsuit names Philadelphia-based Aramark Corporation and multiple subsidiaries. The complaint alleges negligent hiring, training, supervision and retention by Philadelphia-based Aramark and seeks compensatory damages and a jury trial. Baehmann initially sued in Pennsylvania state court; Aramark removed the case to federal court on May 29, 2025. The estate is represented by Kaminsky and Lekh.
The case is Baehmann v. Aramark Corp. et al., No. 2:25-cv-02758, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. To learn more about this case, continue reading here.
About Friedman Schuman Layser PC
Friedman Schuman Layser PC is a full-service law firm based in Fort Washington, PA. The firm has served countless families of wrongful death and other personal injury victims across the state of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Friedman Schuman Layser attorneys try cases in state and federal courts and handle investigations, discovery, and trial through verdict and appeal.
The case is Baehmann v. Aramark Corp. et al., case number 2:25-cv-02758, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
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