Florida Injury Lawyer Blog
Citing the 2015 Florida Supreme Court decision in Sanislo v. Give Kids the World, Inc., defendants in a fatal van accident lawsuit argued before Collier Circuit Judge Hugh Hayes that a liability waiver meant they weren’t liable for a 17-year-old’s death in December 2011. Hayes, though, wasn’t buying it. In rejecting a defense motion for summary judgment, Hayes determined the four-sentence waiver on its own wasn’t enough to free the company from responsibility in this wrongful death case, particularly when the alleged negligence was so egregious. 
Decedent was one of eight youths in a van driven by an employee of a work camp contractor with the Department of Juvenile Justice. Plaintiffs say the 17-year-old was working to turn his life around. He and the other teens were returning from an athletic trip in Daytona Beach – one they had earned with good behavior.
The driver, a 25-year-old employee with a poor driving record who in fact should not have been working for the contractor, was talking on his cell phone when he lost control of the vehicle at a 90-degree curve on a dirt road. After sliding into a traffic sign, the van overturned and flipped into a canal. Seven of the teens got out. One 16-year-old survivor said as he pushed his way out of the van, he felt a tug on his leg. He thrust his hand into the cold water, trying to reach the other passenger, to help pull him up. But their hands slipped.
“And I knew right then, it was (him),” the survivor told The Naples Daily News. Continue reading ›
