I didn't win the Powerball jackpot... who can I sue?
Last May, the boys of Sigma Chi decided to build their own equivalent of a kiddie pool on the front lawn of their fraternity. They then proceeded to drink, as frat boys are wont to do. Eventually, an inebriated Kevin Manning decided that he was properly immortal and that diving head-first into two feet of water from a platform in a tree was a good idea. He was immediately paralyzed from the neck down. He was 20 years old at the time.
Now, nearly a year later, the Gazette-Times reports that Manning has filed a lawsuit. He is suing the fraternity, Oregon State University, and the City of Corvallis for a grand total of $50 million.
I might be able to buy the argument against the fraternity. They had a party where minors were obviously able to obtain alcohol. They constructed the makeshift pool knowing that people would be drinking heavily, because that seems to be what happens at frat parties. However, Manning says that the university is negligent because they granted the party permit to the fraternity in the first place, and then makes the more bizarre claim that Corvallis itself is somehow at fault for his unfortunate injury because they allowed the fraternity to fill the pool with a city water source. The fraternity asked permission to use a fire hydrant to fill the pool and permission was granted, a fairly routine practice here in town. Does this mean that my family can sue Corvallis for wrongful death if I fill my bathtub, pop a bunch of sedatives and drown myself?
I feel for Kevin Manning. His life was shattered before he really had a chance to live it properly, but as much as he would like to angrily blame the world for his misfortune, it seems pretty clear that the blame falls a little closer to home. His attorneys admit that he was drinking, but say that "he was not drunk" when the incident occurred. Except that he clearly was. A quick glance at the police report shows that his blood alcohol level was still 0.22 by the time he had been stabilized and tested at the hospital. If he had been driving, he would have been arrested. If he had injured himself by wrecking his car with a blood alcohol level that high, his insurance company wouldn't even pay his hospital bills, because he would have been considered negligent. How is this different?
Contrast this with the front page story of the Oregonian today, about a little boy named Jordan Clarke, who was born at Oregon Health Sciences University and whose breathing tube was accidentally disconnected after open heart surgery, leaving him blind, brain-damaged and quadriplegic. Because of the Oregon Tort Claims Act, a law that caps damages in lawsuits involving state agencies, Clarke and his family can't receive more than $200,000 from OHSU, even though the hospital admits fault in this case. His medical expenses have already dwarfed that amount, and are expected to reach about $11 million in his lifetime.
There are situations where lawsuits make sense. But nobody pushed Kevin Manning, nobody coerced him into jumping, nobody plied him with booze and then helped him onto the platform. He made a bad choice. It would be great if he would channel his energy into speaking at fraternities and college campuses about the idiocy of binge-drinking and how easy it is to ruin your life in a split second. But he doesn't automatically deserve a multimillion dollar award because he made a horrible, regrettable mistake.
Now, nearly a year later, the Gazette-Times reports that Manning has filed a lawsuit. He is suing the fraternity, Oregon State University, and the City of Corvallis for a grand total of $50 million.
I might be able to buy the argument against the fraternity. They had a party where minors were obviously able to obtain alcohol. They constructed the makeshift pool knowing that people would be drinking heavily, because that seems to be what happens at frat parties. However, Manning says that the university is negligent because they granted the party permit to the fraternity in the first place, and then makes the more bizarre claim that Corvallis itself is somehow at fault for his unfortunate injury because they allowed the fraternity to fill the pool with a city water source. The fraternity asked permission to use a fire hydrant to fill the pool and permission was granted, a fairly routine practice here in town. Does this mean that my family can sue Corvallis for wrongful death if I fill my bathtub, pop a bunch of sedatives and drown myself?
I feel for Kevin Manning. His life was shattered before he really had a chance to live it properly, but as much as he would like to angrily blame the world for his misfortune, it seems pretty clear that the blame falls a little closer to home. His attorneys admit that he was drinking, but say that "he was not drunk" when the incident occurred. Except that he clearly was. A quick glance at the police report shows that his blood alcohol level was still 0.22 by the time he had been stabilized and tested at the hospital. If he had been driving, he would have been arrested. If he had injured himself by wrecking his car with a blood alcohol level that high, his insurance company wouldn't even pay his hospital bills, because he would have been considered negligent. How is this different?
Contrast this with the front page story of the Oregonian today, about a little boy named Jordan Clarke, who was born at Oregon Health Sciences University and whose breathing tube was accidentally disconnected after open heart surgery, leaving him blind, brain-damaged and quadriplegic. Because of the Oregon Tort Claims Act, a law that caps damages in lawsuits involving state agencies, Clarke and his family can't receive more than $200,000 from OHSU, even though the hospital admits fault in this case. His medical expenses have already dwarfed that amount, and are expected to reach about $11 million in his lifetime.
There are situations where lawsuits make sense. But nobody pushed Kevin Manning, nobody coerced him into jumping, nobody plied him with booze and then helped him onto the platform. He made a bad choice. It would be great if he would channel his energy into speaking at fraternities and college campuses about the idiocy of binge-drinking and how easy it is to ruin your life in a split second. But he doesn't automatically deserve a multimillion dollar award because he made a horrible, regrettable mistake.
posted by Corvallist at
6:22 PM
2 Comments:
Thank you Corvallist for letting us all in on the downtown binge twinkling wine fest. I can't wait. Is there a dress code?
Ah shoot. I'm commenting about the wine fest on the wrong post. I guess I am obligated to comment on the frat boy drunken party pool accident lawsuit also.
It's a tragedy, but I agree with you. He made bad choices. I'm sure he is angry that his world and future as he knew it are gone. Who wouldn't be? That's gotta reap bitterness within.
And I can see the frat's liability, allowing drinking, drinking by minors, and combining heavy drinking with a makeshift swimming pool that was probably not monitored by anyone sober. So yeah, sock to them and let them share his pain, but leave the university and the city out of it, and he needs to add his own name to the lawsuit and sue himself for negligance. I hope a judge throws this lawsuit out of court unless the university and city are left off the list.
I guess have my issues over lawsuits. When I was unable to get the normal justice (cops, DA, criminal court charges) when I was beaten severely by staff on a psyche ward, I sought an attorney. I suppose because I have zero money and was judged a mental case, I could not find an attorney who would take the case. The humiliation, frustrations and despair was made complete when the only attorney who gave me an audience gave me twenty bucks to help with gas back to Corvallis and told me to get on with my life. He said he would have taken the case on contingency if I had the money to pay medical consultants needed for the trial. Yeah right. I had a neck disc ruptured into my spinal cord from the beating. I required surgery, a metal neck plate and I will have pain the rest of my life.
Negligance on the private hospitals' part? Hell yes. Plus the fact they then discharged me without shoes, coat or transportation into a snow and ice storm. Slam dunk, I would think, in terms of medical malpractise. But not for someone labeled "mental". I got over it. But I hate shrinks to this day and consider them dangerous. I had nightmares for a few years around Christmas time, which was the anniversary of the beating. I send that hospital a letter every year just before Christmas, to remind them what they got away with doing to me, and that I will never forget.
And as for attorneys, they are what they are. They're out for money, not justice.
Man, I could have fixed a whole lot of cats if I'd won that Powerball jackpot.
By
Anonymous, at 9:05 PM
It seems inefficient at times, but the courts will sort out young Manning’s negligence from the city’s liability. We hear a lot about the cases where the courts impose illogical or extreme penalties, but generally they get it right.
It’s crazy that our cultural conditioning tells us to call a lawyer whenever we’ve been “wronged”. The lawyers have effectively imprinted that notion through good marketing, just as DeBeers has made a diamond the mandatory engagement symbol. It’s become second nature now that whatever misfortune befalls us, we respond with “It’s not my fault”. “Someone should have done something.” Then we find a lawyer to go after the deepest pockets we can find.
Well, Manning was drunk and stupid – his bad. The fraternity possibly encouraged Manning’s drinking and stupidity – not good, but I doubt they held a gun to Manning’s head and forced him to dive. The courts will sort that issue and perhaps we’ll have one less institution of elitist obnoxiousness on campus. But the city was only coincidentally the venue for Manning’s stupidity. If we believe that the city had some sort of liability, do we believe that the city should somehow prohibit stupidity or drunkenness?
Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman advocated a notion that the courts were a natural regulator for all sorts of nonsense. If the Acme ladder company makes defective ladders, the resulting court liabilities would drive them out of business quickly enough. No need for government ladder regulations under his view of the world.
A problem arises when the government decides to shelter an entity like OHSU from liability. They rationalize that advances in medicine can’t take place in an environment threatened by malpractice claims. BS! We have one of the most innovative healthcare systems in the world, and the highest burden of malpractice insurance. Innovation and malpractice responsibility are not mutually exclusive. (Perhaps malpractice responsibility and affordable healthcare are mutually exclusive, but that’s a different debate.)
We need to keep the various legislatures (influenced by the doctors, lawyers, ladder makers, etc.) out of the business of “fixing” the hazards inherent in life. We can’t legislate a utopia, free of stupidity, and devoid of responsibility. If people feel they must bring these cases to a lawyer, let the courts sort it out without artificial controls.
Thanks,
Michael
By
Anonymous, at 9:16 AM
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