Case details
Student: Coaches failed to properly supervise football drills
SUMMARY
$1000000
Amount
Settlement
Result type
Not present
Ruling
KEYWORDS
brain, brain damage, brain injury, concussion, double vision, head, internal bleeding, sensory, speech, traumatic brain injury
FACTS
On Aug. 9, 2016, the plaintiff, a 15-year-old student at Mission Viejo High School, began participating in full-contact football drills as part of practice for the sophomore football team. On that day, he was partnered with a player who outweighed him by 50 pounds and who made direct head-to-head contact with him at full speed. The student was allegedly unable to participate in practice the following day because of continued head pain, but he returned to practice two days later. He continued to participate in full-contact drills, during which he was allegedly subjected to repeated blows to the head via head-to-head contact with other players. After returning home from his second practice, the student took a shower, but was found “asleep” in the shower. As a result, he was brought to the emergency department at a Kaiser hospital that evening. He was diagnosed with a concussion and given protocols prohibiting any physical activity. The student returned to practice the following day to take team photos, but he claimed the coaching staff required him to “shag balls” and to run conditioning drills with the team at the conclusion of practice. He claimed that as a result of the he sustained to his head during the practices, he was unable to return to the sport or the school after Aug. 12, 2016. The student’s mother, Fatima Sabre, acting as the student’s guardian ad litem, sued Saddleback Valley Unified School District, Mission Viejo High School, the county of Orange and the city of Mission Viejo. Sabre alleged that the football coaches violated California Interscholastic Federation guidelines and league rules and failed to have proper techniques taught to novice players. She also alleged that the coaches were negligent in their supervision of the students and that the defendants were liable for the coaches’ actions. The county, the city and the high school were all dismissed on an agreement that all involved parties were employees or agents of the school district and that the school district would provide a defense to all parties involved. The student claimed that he felt pain in his head after sustaining a blow to the head during the football drills on the first day of practice and that he immediately notified a coach about his pain. However, he claimed he was told to get back in the drill, where he was subjected to additional repeated blows to the head during several more repetitions of the drill. The plaintiff further claimed that he notified the coaching staff each time he experienced head pain following the repeated hits to the head, but that nothing else was said to him other than a coach’s requirement that he be at practice the next day least he risk being kicked off the team. The plaintiff claimed he was unable to return to practice the following day due to the continued pain in his head and that when he did present to practice two days later, he told the coaches his head continued to hurt. However, he alleged he was told he had to participate in the drills again, during which he was again subjected to repeated blows to the head via head-to-head contact with other players. The plaintiff claimed that he again notified the coaching staff of his head pain, but that, again, nothing further was said to him other than a coach’s requirement that he be at practice the next day least he risk being kicked off the team. The plaintiff contended that when he was taken to the emergency room on Aug. 11, 2016, after he was found “asleep” in the shower, he was diagnosed with a concussion and given protocols prohibiting any physical activity, which he later provided to the coaching staff. However, he claimed that when he returned to practice the following day to take team photos and provided the hospital’s consultation documentation to the coaching staff, the coaching staff still made him “shag balls” and run conditioning drills with the team, which exacerbated his condition. The school district’s coaches denied being notified about the plaintiff’s alleged condition during any of the practices and denied being provided with the protocols that prohibited any physical activity by the plaintiff., The 15-year-old plaintiff claimed that he suffered one or more concussions, which lead to the rupture of a congenital arachnoid cyst. He alleged that as a result, he suffered a hemorrhage in his intracranial cavity. As a result of his condition, the plaintiff was taken to a hospital, where he underwent an open procedure to drain the developing hematoma, to relieve the building intracranial pressure, to preserve the eyesight due to diplopia caused by the brain bleed and to ultimately put a halt to the brain bleed. The plaintiff claimed that now suffers from chronic pain syndrome and that as a result of his condition, he suffers from anxiety and severe to moderate post-traumatic stress disorder. The plaintiff was eventually enrolled in a home-schooling program to allegedly prevent him from falling too far behind academically and to provide him with the best opportunity to graduate high school. The plaintiff sought recovery of future medical costs, and damages for his past and future human harms and losses.
COURT
Superior Court of Orange County, Orange, CA
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