Will Ski Victims Be Left Out in the Cold?
If the law of simple negligence is reduced to its most basic non-legal terminology, a reasonable description could be “if you aren’t paying attention to what you are doing and you cause an accident, then you are liable for the consequences.” At least, I thought that was true until I received the Court’s decision in the case of Gary Ricci v. Charles Schoultz, M.D. (Case No. 971189-CA, July 23, 1998), a ski accident/collision case I tried several years ago. The Court of Appeals decision in this case not only challenged the “Golden Rule” of negligence, but several other basic principles of negligence that we have all taken for granted. Therefore, I would like to explore with you the case and the Court’s opinion.
The facts of this case are fairly simple. On a beautiful day in April 1996, Gary Ricci, a shell fisherman from Rhode Island, was skiing across a flat runout area on one of the easiest trails at the Snowbird Ski Resort. The snow was catted smooth, the weather was perfect, there was little traffic on the trail and no reason to expect trouble. Gary was skiing on the left side of the trail and 10 to 15-feet to his right was another skier who seemed to be in control of his skis and skiing well. Suddenly, Gary noticed a problem out of the corner of his eye. The other skier’s skis seemed to separate at the tips, and then the skier (a Texas doctor named Schoultz) leaned sharply to the left and began skiing right at him. Gary tried to get out of the way but didn’t have time, and Schoultz literally knocked him off the trail. Both Ricci and Schoultz wound up in trees well off to the left of the catted ski run.
Schoultz skied away. Ricci was not so lucky. He broke several ribs, fractured his lumbar spine, sustained serious internal injuries and had to be lifeflighted to the hospital. Some of his injuries have been permanently disabling.
At trial, Schoultz admitted that he was an advanced skier and was more than capable of safely negotiating such an easy slope under the perfect weather conditions that existed on the day of the accident. Instead, defendant claimed that my client had simply “run him down from behind” while he was skiing straight ahead and “minding his own business.”
Read the entire article here.
This article was written by Jeff Eisenberg, for more information please click here.
