By Rob Harris, of Golf Dispute Resolution
Being a passenger in a vehicle that is rear-ended typically is as close to a free pass to monetary damages as the law provides. However, at least in Indiana, make sure the vehicle is a car and not a golf cart.
David D. Wooten learned this the hard way, as the Indiana Court of Appeals this week denied his claims against the driver of the cart that plowed into his backside.
As the court explained:
This case stems from an incident that occurred between two participants at a VIP golf scramble at Chariot Run Golf Course, in Harrison County, Indiana. … Caesars paired [David] Wooten, [Bernard] Chamernik, James Malles…, and James North…, none of whom knew each other, as partners for the scramble. Wooten was the only one who had previously played at Chariot Run and who was familiar with its layout. Caesars provided all teams with golf carts—Wooten and Malles rode in one golf cart and Chamernik and North rode in a second golf cart behind them. Although Chariot Run features paved asphalt paths for the golf carts, participants were allowed to “drive the carts on the fairway” and to pull the “cart up close to where [the] ball was and hit it.”
Wooten’s team started the scramble at the twelfth hole. The fourteenth hole was a blind shot from the tee, after which Malles and Wooten rode ahead in their cart on the cart path. Chamernik followed behind, while looking for his ball on the fairway. Malles stopped the golf cart on the path near the green on the downward slope of a hill. Wooten was “leaning up to get out of the cart” when it was hit from behind by Chamernik “at a low rate of speed.”
Wooten was a trouper. Although his “neck ‘snapped backwards’ and started ‘bothering’ him, and his ears started ringing, …. [h]e took some over the counter pain reliever and continued to play.” At the turn, by which point he was “also experiencing blurred visison,” EMTs were called, and they diagnosed Wooten as suffering from whiplash. Nonetheless, they “cleared him to play without any further treatment.” Continue he did, which was a good thing from the golf perspective, as his team won first place. Five days later, complaining of continuing pain, Wooten checked himself into the hospital, where he was diagnosed with a neck sprain and strain.
Litigation followed, with the trial court and subsequently the Court of Appeals, holding that Wooten’s claims against Chamernik, the driver of the other cart, must be dismissed. According to the court, the golf cart has become part and parcel of the modern golf game, with an unremitting presence on the fairway. Wooten himself admitted that it has become common and expected for golf carts to bump into each other. Accordingly, even though incidents of this sort might be actionable during non-golf related activities, this conduct, like hitting an errant drive or the lack of yelling ‘fore’, has now become “within the range of ordinary behavior of participants” in golf and therefore, as a matter of law, it cannot support a claim for negligence. However, “[i]n any sporting activity, a participant’s particular conduct may exceed the ambit of such reasonableness as a matter of law if the participant either intentionally caused injury or engaged in reckless conduct.” Nevertheless, the designated evidence fails to establish any recklessness or intent on the part of Chamernik when driving the golf cart. … There is no evidence that Chamernik had been involved in any horseplay or other questionable behavior while driving the golf cart.
[W]e recognize that encouragement to participate in golf implicitly discourages excessive litigation of claims by persons who suffer injuries from participants’ conduct. The inclusion of golf carts in the sport is “commonly understood” and while an inexact operation of a cart may somewhat “increase the normal risks attendant to the activities of ordinary life outside the sports arena, it does not render unreasonable the ordinary conduct” within the golf game, in the absence of intent or recklessness.
