HARRISBURG – A couple have lost an appeal to a summary judgment against a ski resort operator due to failure to claim injuries from negligence.
Judge Alice Dubow, on the bench of the Superior Court of Pennsylvania, issued a 13-page ruling, combined with a dissenting memorandum by Judge Eugene Strassburger, that affirmed the Court of Common Pleas of York County, which had granted summary judgment to Snow Time Inc. in the lawsuit initiated by Ray and Mary Ann Bourgeois.
Mr. and Mrs. Bourgeois sued Snow Time, and Ski Roundtop Operating Corp. for personal injuries after a day at Roundtop Mountain Resorts, one of the appellee's ski venues.
In 2015, as stated in the ruling, Ray Bourgeois got "seriously injured while snow tubing when his tube crossed folded anti-fatigue rubber kitchen mats, which Appellees had placed in the deceleration area of the snow tubing run."
The Bourgeoises claimed that Snow Time "acted recklessly and with gross negligence by placing the mats at the end of the tubing run to aid in tube deceleration."
On Jul. 24, 2015, Mr. and Ms. Bourgeois filed a complaint against Snow Time and Ski Roundtop for "negligence, gross negligence, recklessness, and loss of consortium."
The companies filed a motion for summary judgment, which was granted on June 19, 2017.
In the ruling, Judge Dubow stated that the Bourgeois "did not establish a prima facie claim for recklessness or gross negligence and thus, the trial court did not err in granting summary judgment on these issues."
Citing similar cases and the Restatement of Torts, Dubow emphasized the importance of the intention when analyzing the appellants' claims of recklessness at the ski resort.
"An element of recklessness is the failure of the defendant to do any act that he has a duty to do for the plaintiff," Dubow said in the ruling. She added that the Bourgeois "should have known about the standard of care," essential on negligence cases.
The ruling also mentioned that "since Appellants failed to meet this element of recklessness and gross negligence, the trial court properly granted Appellees’ Motion for Summary Judgment on this issue."
Judge Strassburger disagreed with Dubow and another judge in the panel, issuing a dissenting memorandum that questioned the lower court decision of granting summary judgment to Snow Time.