Defendant's Attorney: Burlington, Vermont insurance defense lawyer represented the Defendant.

Description: Burlington, Vermont personal injury lawyers represented the Plaintiff who sued on premises liability negligence theories.

Plaintiff Richard Grajeda brings this negligence action against Vail Resorts Inc., Vail Resorts Management Company, and Okemo Limited Liability Company (collectively, “Defendants”), seeking damages for injuries he sustained in a collision with a snowmaking station while skiing at Okemo Mountain Resort (“Okemo”). Plaintiff claims Defendants inadequately padded the snowmaking station because the padding did not extend to the base of the station, allowing him to collide with the station's bare metal pole. He also asserts that Defendants negligently placed the snowmaking station in the center of a beginner's trail.

On December 19, 2019, Plaintiff went skiing with friends at Okemo. At the time, there were no issues with visibility. Plaintiff had skied twice before, approximately seven years prior, and considered himself to be a beginner skier. That morning, Plaintiff rode the B Quad chair lift to a ski trail called “Lower Mountain Road.” During his first run down that trail, Plaintiff fell while attempting to come to a complete stop but was able to “g[e]t back up and resume[]” skiing. (Doc. 89-4 at 19.) As he was skiing, he passed several pieces of snowmaking equipment.

On his second run, Plaintiff again rode the B Quad chair lift and began skiing down the same trail. As he approached the lower section of Lower Mountain Road, he encountered a group of ski school students crossing the trail in front of him. Plaintiff saw the group when they were approximately fifteen to twenty feet ahead of him and veered to the left to avoid them. As he did so, he hit an icy patch and fell onto his left hip. His skis came off and he slid down the ski trail on his left side and then on his stomach. Plaintiffs head and shoulders faced uphill as he slid, so that he could not see where he was sliding. He testified in deposition that: “As I was sliding, [I] felt a dip in the snow, and then I went under something, and I slammed into a metal pole or a steel pole.” Id. at 31. He later stated: “The impact was very hard on my back. I could almost feel it reverberating or something.” (Doc. 98-12 at 3.)

Under Vermont law, “[c]ommon law negligence has four elements: a legal duty owed by defendant to plaintiff, a breach of that duty, actual injury to the plaintiff, and a causal link between the breach and the injury.” Demag v. Better Power Equip., Inc., 2014 VT 78, ¶ 6, 197 Vt. 176, 179, 102 A.3d 1101, 1105 (internal quotation marks omitted). Defendants argue that under Vermont's Sports Injury Statute, 12 V.S.A. § 1037, they had no duty to exercise reasonable care with respect to the snowmaking equipment Plaintiff struck because Plaintiff s injuries resulted from an obvious and necessary danger inherent in the sport of skiing.

Outcome: The jury in U.S. District Court in Vermont has rejected negligence claims filed by Richard Grajeda III, 24, of Westbury, New York, against Okemo Mountain and its parent company, Vail Resorts Inc. and Vail Resorts Management Co., of Bloomfield, Colorado.

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