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Jay Peak Lawsuit

Domeskier

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Then how in the world did it worm its way into your argument?

I know I promised to bow out of my role as amateur PI attorney, but this was just too much to pass up. Let's rehearse. I make some claim about how your resort might be found to have breached a duty to some skier it was teaching. Some poster responds with a tired old meme of Picard expressing what the poster obviously intended to be interpreted as exasperation at my claim. I respond by interpreting it is acknowledgement on the part of Picard that my argument is incontrovertable and your resort will be liable for significant damages. Since your resort is probably not the premier destination for foreign celebrities, the only other reason I could think of for why Picard might care is that the verdict would put in jeopardy something you could offer him that premier resorts could not. How anyone could interpret this (feeble perhaps) attempt at a joke as an argument for the claim that your resort breached a duty to that child? Is your economic development program such a sore spot for the JP PR and marketing departments that it impairs your sense of humor? I realize your resort is located in one of the more insular and xenophobic parts of this country, but I would have thought that the majorty of your target demographic wouldn't care, particularly when many of them are Canadian. Perhaps you should leave the resort propaganda to the PR department.
 

dlague

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Last night, I though more about this high traffic run out idea mentioned by Domeskier. Not many advanced skiers will ski down Lower River Quai. In fact, advanced skiers are more than likely to stay more to the skiers right and come out by Flyer due to areas such as Beaver Pond meadows, Andre's Paradise, Everglades, Green Mountain Boys and Exhibition. In fact, Upper Goat Run most often is used to cross over to Stateside and most ski right by Lower River Quai. Lastly, Lower River Quai is not part of a main path from the summit or any other chair.. For all of these reasons, Lower River Quai is not a heavily traveled trail by advanced skiers. Then again if someone has never skied there then they can only argue that with out merit. If you ski there often then you know. The following video shows that section of the trail and where it connects to Interstate. Pay attention to the number of skiers (crickets)!

Starting at 1:47 - 5:00 Where the Shack is at 5:00 is the top of Lower River Quai

BTW look up any video regarding Jay Peak Tram and every single video shows little to no traffic.

Domeskier - you definitely have a beef with something about Jay Peak!
 
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Domeskier

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I had considered starting a new thread on this topic, by my interest in pursuing a second career as an amateur personal injury attorney is fast waning. However, I thought it would be helpful/interesting to see if I could locate and caselaw on the issue of whether resorts have additional duties to patrons that they are teaching to ski. Since the cases I found are outside of Vermont, they would not be accorded any deference in the present case. Nor am I providing these cases in support of my claims. In fact, I think the court in the Colorado case would be hostile to it. I simply put them out there for interested parties who would like to see how courts have actually addressed these matters, rather than how amateurs (myself included) think they ought to address them.

The following case out of Washington involves a novice ski racer who collided with a tow rope shed after missing a gate and veering off a slalom course while in race school. The court reverses the trail court's summary judgment in favor of the resort and the race school on the grounds that the plaintiff could potentially show that the resort and the ski school were negligent in laying out the course. There is an interesting discussion in the opinion of what risks a person assumes when they are skiing and what risks they do not assume. Those of you who think that the fact that skiing is inherently dangerous entails that resorts should be immune from all liability to skiers injured on their property (except in the case of equipment failures, etc) might do well to read this opinion. I did not find the disposition of this case on remand. It may have been settled out of court.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=3693514438502828297&q=%22ski+resort%22+%22ski+school%22+collision&hl=en&as_sdt=6,33

Below is a link to a case out of Colorado. In this case, the court upholds summary judgment in favor of the resort and ski school in a case where a skier was injured during a ski lesson. The plaintiff had argued that the instructor was negligent in pushing the student to attempt a green run off the top of the mountain. The opinion includes an interesting discussion of the law applicable to the coach/student relationship in inherently dangerous sports. The court denies that mere negligence in the selection of a slope would be grounds for liability, but suggests that recklessness could be.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=10821104885427464067&q=%22ski+resort%22+%22ski+school%22+easiest&hl=en&as_sdt=6,33

Again, I am not providing these cases as support for anything I have said in this thread. Anyone with a passing familiarity with America's adversarial legal system knows that most opinions include claims that can be used to support any position and, where they appear to be contrary, can be distinguished away. Since the only peson in this thread who appears to have any actual experience suing or defending personal injury cases cannot participate for professional reasons, I'm not sure how much value there is in this exercise. But it sure beats hearing us amateurs opine on what we think the law ought to be.
 

Domeskier

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Domeskier - you definitely have a beef with something about Jay Peak!

Nope. I don't particularly like the way this Steve character comports himself, and that may have inspired me to spin some of the facts here to the point of hyperbole, but I have no ill-will toward Jay Peak or any ski area (other than maybe Mountain Creek!). I do think the attitude of some posters here that ski areas are philanthropic organizations that have an independent moral right to impose any risks they want on people who pay to use their services is naive. I think the attitude expressed by some in this thread that anyone who sues a ski area for personal injuries is looking for an easy payday or has no sense of personal responsibility is presumptuous. I think ski areas have a duty to provide a product that does not increase the inherent risks of the sport. I think that someone who is injured by a risk that they did not assume has a moral right to reimbursement by the party at fault, whether or not they actually sue. I think that ski resorts have a moral (if not legal) duty to provide a safe learning environment to novice skiers. I think that ski areas generally do a good job in this regard. I think it is a question for the court whether JP provided a safe learning environment for this child. I think the court could reasonably go either way on this question. I think it would be unfortunate if the case does not survive the summary judgment phase because some legislators have decided as a matter of law that the risk of collisions at a ski area is always going to be allocated to the skiers involved and never to the resort. I think laws like that undermine the motivation for ski resorts to make sure they provide a safe product and to eliminate unnecessary risks. I think if I were charged with selecting a jury in this case, I would make sure there were no skiers on it!!
 

deadheadskier

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Nope. I don't particularly like the way this Steve character comports himself, and that may have inspired me to spin some of the facts here to the point of hyperbole, but I have no ill-will toward Jay Peak or any ski area (other than maybe Mountain Creek!). I do think the attitude of some posters here that ski areas are philanthropic organizations that have an independent moral right to impose any risks they want on people who pay to use their services is naive. I think the attitude expressed by some in this thread that anyone who sues a ski area for personal injuries is looking for an easy payday or has no sense of personal responsibility is presumptuous. I think ski areas have a duty to provide a product that does not increase the inherent risks of the sport. I think that someone who is injured by a risk that they did not assume has a moral right to reimbursement by the party at fault, whether or not they actually sue. I think that ski resorts have a moral (if not legal) duty to provide a safe learning environment to novice skiers. I think that ski areas generally do a good job in this regard. I think it is a question for the court whether JP provided a safe learning environment for this child. I think the court could reasonably go either way on this question. I think it would be unfortunate if the case does not survive the summary judgment phase because some legislators have decided as a matter of law that the risk of collisions at a ski area is always going to be allocated to the skiers involved and never to the resort. I think laws like that undermine the motivation for ski resorts to make sure they provide a safe product and to eliminate unnecessary risks. I think if I were charged with selecting a jury in this case, I would make sure there were no skiers on it!!

And Mr moose concisely and eloquently refuted your arguments.

Others not so eloquently

You are not going to persuade anyone because your arguments are garbage on so many levels that you sound like a dirty money grubbing attorney...... part of the problem.
 

Steve@jpr

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This is really, really last word(s) being left, yes? Spare me your grandstanding.

I know I promised to bow out of my role as amateur PI attorney, but this was just too much to pass up. Let's rehearse. I make some claim about how your resort might be found to have breached a duty to some skier it was teaching. Some poster responds with a tired old meme of Picard expressing what the poster obviously intended to be interpreted as exasperation at my claim. I respond by interpreting it is acknowledgement on the part of Picard that my argument is incontrovertable and your resort will be liable for significant damages. Since your resort is probably not the premier destination for foreign celebrities, the only other reason I could think of for why Picard might care is that the verdict would put in jeopardy something you could offer him that premier resorts could not. How anyone could interpret this (feeble perhaps) attempt at a joke as an argument for the claim that your resort breached a duty to that child? Is your economic development program such a sore spot for the JP PR and marketing departments that it impairs your sense of humor? I realize your resort is located in one of the more insular and xenophobic parts of this country, but I would have thought that the majorty of your target demographic wouldn't care, particularly when many of them are Canadian. Perhaps you should leave the resort propaganda to the PR department.
 

Domeskier

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And Mr moose concisely and eloquently refuted your arguments.

Others not so eloquently

You are not going to persuade anyone because your arguments are garbage on so many levels that you sound like a dirty money grubbing attorney...... part of the problem.

Mr. Moose just rehashed the same dumb arguments about skiing being inherently dangerous and concluding that resorts have no obligation to remove unnecessary risks. If that were the case, there would be no reason for legislators to enact laws limiting the liability for ski areas for acts of negligence. I guess I would rather sound like a money grubbing attorney than some resentful backwoods hick who is incapable of understanding the complexities of risk allocation in advanced industrial societies.
 

dlague

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Nope. I don't particularly like the way this Steve character comports himself, and that may have inspired me to spin some of the facts here to the point of hyperbole, but I have no ill-will toward Jay Peak or any ski area (other than maybe Mountain Creek!). I do think the attitude of some posters here that ski areas are philanthropic organizations that have an independent moral right to impose any risks they want on people who pay to use their services is naive. I think the attitude expressed by some in this thread that anyone who sues a ski area for personal injuries is looking for an easy payday or has no sense of personal responsibility is presumptuous. I think ski areas have a duty to provide a product that does not increase the inherent risks of the sport. I think that someone who is injured by a risk that they did not assume has a moral right to reimbursement by the party at fault, whether or not they actually sue. I think that ski resorts have a moral (if not legal) duty to provide a safe learning environment to novice skiers. I think that ski areas generally do a good job in this regard. I think it is a question for the court whether JP provided a safe learning environment for this child. I think the court could reasonably go either way on this question. I think it would be unfortunate if the case does not survive the summary judgment phase because some legislators have decided as a matter of law that the risk of collisions at a ski area is always going to be allocated to the skiers involved and never to the resort. I think laws like that undermine the motivation for ski resorts to make sure they provide a safe product and to eliminate unnecessary risks. I think if I were charged with selecting a jury in this case, I would make sure there were no skiers on it!!

:blink: This is like buying a car! Painful! Just search on Jay Peak Tram it goes right over those trails. I am not sure how much safer anyone cold make it! I am out!
 

dlague

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Mr. Moose just rehashed the same dumb arguments about skiing being inherently dangerous and concluding that resorts have no obligation to remove unnecessary risks. If that were the case, there would be no reason for legislators to enact laws limiting the liability for ski areas for acts of negligence. I guess I would rather sound like a money grubbing attorney than some resentful backwoods hick who is incapable of understanding the complexities of risk allocation in advanced industrial societies.

:puke:
 

Domeskier

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:blink: This is like buying a car! Painful! Just search on Jay Peak Tram it goes right over those trails. I am not sure how much safer anyone cold make it! I am out!

You have latched on to one relevant factor in the analysis that the court might consider. Thanks for the contrary evidence you provided. I'm beginning to think that a general public skiing forum is not the best place for someone interested in having a nuanced and complex debate involving the ability to focus on abstract concepts and arguments with more than one premise.
 

from_the_NEK

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You have latched on to one relevant factor in the analysis that the court might consider. Thanks for the contrary evidence you provided.
What is that evidence again? I guess I'm too much of a backwoods hick to interpret it :dontknow:.

I'm beginning to think that a general public skiing forum is not the best place for someone interested in having a nuanced and complex debate involving the ability to focus on abstract concepts and arguments with more than one premise.

I'd say we've had a good debate but your side of it keeps losing no matter how smart you try to make it sound.
 

mister moose

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Mr. Moose just rehashed the same dumb arguments about skiing being inherently dangerous and concluding that resorts have no obligation to remove unnecessary risks. If that were the case, there would be no reason for legislators to enact laws limiting the liability for ski areas for acts of negligence. I guess I would rather sound like a money grubbing attorney than some resentful backwoods hick who is incapable of understanding the complexities of risk allocation in advanced industrial societies.

I see we've downgraded this discussion to include insults. You didn't answer a single question I raised. I never said resorts have no obligation to remove unnecessary risks. You haven't even established what risks present in this accident are unnecessary, created by the resort (such as in the case you cited where the resort constructed a dangerous race course) or specific to this location that is not present in other locations. All you've shown so far is an above average unfamiliarity with ski instruction, terrain selection, skier cross section on any trail, and how Jay Peak is laid out. And goooolly gee, Aunt Bee, can you please explain to this dumb backwoods hick just what 'nuanced' means:

You have latched on to one relevant factor in the analysis that the court might consider. Thanks for the contrary evidence you provided. I'm beginning to think that a general public skiing forum is not the best place for someone interested in having a nuanced and complex debate involving the ability to focus on abstract concepts and arguments with more than one premise.

All you've done is ignore the points raised, throw words in my mouth, and add in insults. Stellar performance.
 

Domeskier

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What is that evidence again? I guess I'm too much of a backwoods hick to interpret it :dontknow:.

His evidence that Interstate is not a heavily trafficked runout. Perhaps your first instinct in a debate is to dig in your heals and close your eyes to anything that does not support your position. I'm more inclined to follow Emerson on this one.
 

Domeskier

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I see we've downgraded this discussion to include insults.

you can thank DHS for that.

I have stated my position very plainly ad nauseum. If you are going to assume the responsibility of teaching someone to engage in an inherently dangerous activity, you should do so in a way that does not unnecessarily increase the risks of that activity. It is a question for the courts to decide whether JP or any other resort has satisfied that duty. All you have done is appeal to how resorts are in fact run. That may be relevant to a degree. But in the final analysis, the court will be addressing the normative question of how resorts ought to to be run, and all of your anecdotal evidence about how you've seen resorts operated will be mostly beside the point.
 
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Abubob

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You have latched on to one relevant factor in the analysis that the court might consider. Thanks for the contrary evidence you provided. I'm beginning to think that a general public skiing forum is not the best place for someone interested in having a nuanced and complex debate involving the ability to focus on abstract concepts and arguments with more than one premise.

 

Domeskier

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Where to start....
a resort breached its heightened duty of care when a novice skier is injured by a more advanced skier
This happens anywhere more advanced skiers are mixed with lesser abilty skiers, ie everywhere. There is no group, no novice teaching area where everyone is at the same skill level, or skis at the same speed.
.

This is a factual claim that is irrelevant to the question of whether advanced skiers ought to be skiing through areas were novices are receiving lessons.

a court could reasonably conclude that a resort owes a higher duty of care to people it is teaching to ski than to people to whom it simply sells a lift ticket.
Why? Why is the standard of care higher?

Because they have assumed control over the skier. I have no duty to render aid to you if I see you lying on the side of the trail bleeding to death. If I do assume the responsibility of providing that aid to you, I assume the risk that I could cause you further harm and be liable for those injuries (unless there is a good samaritan statute that overrides my common law duties to you).

I think it is absurd to suggest that the only duty a ski area owes to the people it teaches to ski...
is to give quality instruction? That is what is being contracted for. The job title is Instructor, not Bodyguard, or Defender Against All Distracted/Out of Control 3rd Parties.

When you exercise control over some party, you typically incur a higher standard of care to them.

You invalidate your own argument. It is this paragraph that makes me question if you ski at all. Have you ever been on a novice trail??? Kids ski at all speeds all the time, including the most sedate isolated from traffic bunny slope. Happens all the time. There is no trail that meets your criteria.
.

Once again you are trying to draw a normative conclusion from descriptive premises. A court might think that a ski area has a duty to close off any area where it conducts lessons for novices.

novice skiers do not have the skills or experience to adequately know or respond to the risks of skiing
The assumption of risk takes place upon the purchase of the lesson, not the choice of which green trail. People fall down. People run into eachother. Been going on for years. On every trail. Read the back of the lift ticket.
.

Should these contracts of adhesion absolve a ski resort from its obligation to people it has voluntarily assumed control over?


You seem to be saying that since there is something more that could have been done, then the resort is liable. Well there is always something more that could be done.


No, I'm saying that where a ski area imposes unnecessary risks on skiers it has assumed the responsibility for teaching, it should be liable if those unecessary risks result in harm to the student.
 

mister moose

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you can thank DHS for that.

I have stated my position very plainly ad nauseum. If you are going to assume the responsibility of teaching someone to engage in an inherently dangerous activity, you should do so in a way that does not unnecessarily increase the risks of that activity. It is a question for the courts to decide whether JP or any other resort has satisfied that duty. All you have done is appeal to how resorts are in fact run. That may be relevant to a degree. But in the final analysis, the court will be addressing the normative question of how resorts ought to to be run, and all of your anecdotal evidence about how you've seen resorts operated will be mostly beside the point.

Of course it's for the courts to decide, should it get that far. It is a long winding and evolving road to get to just what is 'reasonable care'. But I can tell you this much, if I was the instructor and you came to me with expectations like you have outlined, I would decline the lesson. I don't want to or need to assume the risks you are asking me to assume, and I am not capable of providing such an extraordinary degree of care for you and the rest of the students in the class at all times and places.
 

from_the_NEK

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But in the final analysis, the court will be addressing the normative question of how resorts ought to to be run, and all of your anecdotal evidence about how you've seen resorts operated will be mostly beside the point.

This is why laws have been made by states to somewhat "protect" resorts from sympathetic court/jury rulings that may award damages to a plaintiff based on little understanding of how resorts are able to operate. A judgment finding a resort even partially responsible for an incident they really have no control over would set a precedence and open the floodgates to endless suits.
As stated it would be nearly impossible financially and/or physically for resorts to remove all risk. If everyone who hit a tree on the side of the trail was able to claim the resort was negligent to some certain extent by leaving that tree 6" further into trail than all of the other trees, resorts would be uninsurable and unable to financially sustain themselves in an industry that is often already struggling with slim profit margins. (Note: I just read the death at Killington thread and my example above was not intended in any way as a reference to that specific incident :oops:)

Then we would all have to hike for turns.... WAIT.... we can't do that because everyone would post their land as no trespassing fearing that they would get sued by someone getting hurt playing on their property (luckily Vermont actually has a law protecting landowners from these types of suits as well).
If you don't like the way Vermont has refused to cower to people trying to lay blame on everyone else when engaging in "risky" recreation, feel free to stay the hell out of my hick backcountry woods.
 
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