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Old Fri Apr 16, 2004, 10:56pm
gsf23 gsf23 is offline
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Join Date: Oct 2002
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This is about the only thing I could find. Here is the website and I have posted the relevant parts.

http://library.lp.findlaw.com/articl...portslaw_1_163

The past two decades have seen the emergence of two new areas of sports liability: lawsuits between participants in the sport and actions against officials administering the rules of the game. Recently, the Connecticut Supreme Court issued two important decisions in this area.

The first decision, Santopietro v. New Haven, involved an injury to a spectator. Court decisions involving spectators suing the players or the operators of a sports arena when they were struck by balls, pucks or other objects go back many years. In fact, there is a 1924 decision reported in a lawsuit against a Boston Red Sox pitcher whose errant throw to third base struck a spectator. The only thing special about that case was the pitcher: George Herman "Babe" Ruth. The Sox lost the game but won the lawsuit.

The Santopietro case was somewhat different. The lawsuit was brought against two umpires of a softball game, alleging that their failure to maintain control of the game and the players led to a thrown bat striking a spectator in the head, causing a skull fracture. The umpires prevailed at the trial, and the injured spectator appealed. In its review of the case, the Connecticut Supreme Court agreed that umpires have a duty to enforce the rules, exercise reasonable judgment and maintain control of the game to prevent risk of injury to others, including spectators. In other words, if a game official fails to adequately enforce the rules, and that failure leads directly to injury of another person by a game participant, the official may be held liable.

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