Everyone knows about waivers you sign when you go to certain events.
If you are going on a ski lift you sign a waiver of your right to sue.
If you go to a Pirate game, somewhere on that ticket it will talk about a waiver of any injuries sustained from incidents like a baseball hitting you in the head.
The question is are there exceptions to these waivers?
I found an interesting case on this issue of waivers regarding a Go Kart injury.
In a Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania personal injury case, that issue is what the Court had to decide.
What happened was the injured party bought a ticket to ride a Go Kart on a track owned by a company called Lehigh Valley Grand
Prix, Inc.
On the third lap around the track on the Go Kart, he got cut by a plastic covering around the guardrail that had broken off and was sticking out towards the track.
The protruding plastic covering snagged the rider.
As a result, the victim sustained a laceration of his leg which was 2″ wide.
Now for the twist.
About 6 months before his injuries, the victim had been at the track.
At that time he signed a written waiver of his right to sue the Go Kart company for any injuries he would sustain.
Then 6 months go by and he is back at the track and the injuries described above happened to him.
Did his signing of the waiver from suing the Go Kart track 6 months before, act to bar him from pursuing this personal injury claim?
What are your thoughts on that?
The waiver form that he signed did not put a time limit on its application.
In other words, the waiver was for an unlimited period of time.
Meaning forever.
The Court ruled that the parties who agreed to the waiver in the first place intended that it would only last for a certain reasonable period of time.
The Court further ruled that a 6 month lapse from the time he signed the first waiver until he was injured was just too long to make it enforceable against the injured party.
The bottom line is the Court ruled that the Go Kart track owners were still going to have to face a jury on this issue.
Signing a waiver 6 months before was just not valid in this instance.
That seems like a good common sense decision to Pittsburgh Premises Liability, Wrongful Death, Car Accident, Medical Malpractice and Slip & Fall Attorney Bernie Tully.
Do you agree?
Can you believe these kinds of ?? keep me up at night? Ha Ha
Well that is it for now. Thanks for reading
Bernie the Attorney