The trickle-down effect is on full display when it comes to negligence lawsuits and sports leagues or organizations.
Pop Warner Little Scholars, Inc., the organization that runs Pop Warner Football programs across the U.S., is the latest target. It was sued in California state court earlier this month by the family of a youth football player, Donnovan Hill, who was paralyzed after making a tackle during a 2011 football game.
The plaintiffs alleged in the suit that Hill was taught an unsafe “head-first” technique by his coaches. Further, it claimed that the Pop Warner and its affiliate entities failed to ensure the coaches, who were also named as defendants, complied with the rules that that were in place that ban such tackling.
Hill, who was 13 and a member of the Lakewood (Calif.) Black Lancers, suffered the injury during a game on Nov. 6, 2011 in Laguna Hills, Calif.
“As Donnovan approached contact with his opponent, he dropped his head down, kept his arms at his side and initiated the tackle head-first,” according to the lawsuit. “Upon contact with the opposing player, Donnovan immediately went limp and dropped to the field unmoving.” He was then rushed to the emergency room, where he informed those around him that he could not feel his legs. Doctors at Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center later determined that Hill suffered a catastrophic spinal cord injury, resulting in quadriplegia, including paralysis from the neck down.
The plaintiffs claimed that the coaches’ “alleged conduct was reckless and grossly negligent because they were aware of the dangers and the occurrences of improper tackling. Their approach unreasonably increased the risks beyond those inherent in the sport, was entirely outside the range of ordinary activity involved in teaching or coaching football tackling techniques, and directly violated league-wide safety standard.”
Furthermore, it claimed that they regularly observed Donnovan “tackling in an incorrect and dangerous manner in practices and at games. Coaches encouraged and promoted such technique by directly ordering the head-first tackling and even lauding it as ‘tough.’ ”
The plaintiffs are asking the court to award damages, including punitive damages, to the maximum extent allowable by law.
Three months ago, Pop Warner, USA Football and the NFL announced Pop Warner’s endorsement of Heads Up Football. Jon Butler, executive director of Pop Warner Football, said that all 1,300 of organization’s associations will go through Heads Up training before the start of the 2014 season.
In a recent comment on the story, Bobby Hosea, president of Train ‘Em Up Academy, Inc., offered the following: “Due diligence is the missing ingredient. If asked, every tackle football coach in America will tell you they coach SAFE football when it comes to tackling. The truth is, SAFETY is only a word if a coach doesn’t know what is inherently dangerous about the techniques, drills and terminology he uses to teach the players how to tackle. The answer to ensuring players are being taught the ‘least’ dangerous tackling technique that lowers the risk of catastrophic upper torso injuries that results in a lawsuit, is to establish a ‘Standard of Care’ on the youth and high school levels that certifies every coach can readily identify, eliminate and replace injurious behavior from their tackling instruction.”
Legal Analysis: Challenges for Plaintiffs
Eugene Egdorf of the Lanier Law Firm, an expert on concussion litigation, believes the Pop Warner suit could be a harbinger of more litigation.
“Unlike NFL players or even college players, one can’t reasonably argue that youths have an appreciation of and knowingly assumed the risks associated with football,” he told Sports Litigation Alert. “We expect youth sports leagues to not only teach our children to enjoy great games and the values they instill, but to do so in a manner that keeps our children safe. While injuries will always be a part of any sport, even at the youth level, youth leagues have a duty to take reasonable steps to minimize such occurrences, including the education of coaches and players to play the game safely.
“If the alleged facts of this case are true, that coaches in fact instructed, demanded and praised unsafe tackling, they should be punished. That has no place in sports period, much less youths.
“Without more facts, however, tagging Pop Warner for liability will likely be far more difficult. This does not appear to be like the NFL that knowingly hid dangers from players or set up policies that encouraged dangerous play. Nor do they seem to argue that Pop Warner encouraged unsafe tackling. Rather, plaintiffs seemingly argue that Pop Warner should have monitored the practices of thousands of coaches and known when a harmful technique was being taught. I’m not sure a court or jury will find that to be reasonable.”
