Personal Injury
Situation:
Did the customer assume the risk of a tippy all-terrain vehicle (ATV)?
Our client, a 48 year-old mother of four teenagers, was spending Thanksgiving weekend with her family at their cabin in the north woods of Minnesota. The family owned two “four wheelers”, all terrain vehicles (ATVs), and went to the local motor sports center to shop for another one. While there, a salesman introduced them to a brand new type of four-wheeler that had side-by-side seats, rather than the saddle-type seat on the ATVs that our client was accustomed to.
The salesman encouraged her to take this new four-wheeler out for a test drive in the field behind their showroom. Our client first asked whether the new all-terrain vehicle would tip over because it looked “very tippy”. The salesman assured her that it was impossible, because he and another mechanic had climbed aboard one side of the all-terrain vehicle and stood on it, trying to rock it over on its side, but could not.
Our client and her 12 year-old daughter went out for a test-drive and, as they were rounding the first turn, the ATV flipped over, catapulting the daughter clear of the ATV (she was uninjured) then landing on top of the back of our client, who was lying face down on the ground. Our client suffered a broken leg, a cracked vertebrae in her spine and a number of other internal injuries. She was airlifted by helicopter to a medical center in Fargo, North Dakota where she remained in critical condition for several days. She has since made an excellent recovery.
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Successful Resolution: $500,000
At first, the Sports Center refused to even discuss a settlement, claiming that our client “assumed the risk” of riding a machine that had a tendency to roll over. After our investigation uncovered the conversation between our client and the company salesman just before the test drive, and taking statements of witnesses and hiring an ATV expert to prove how dangerous this new model ATV actually was, the sports center’s insurance carrier agreed to a settlement of $500,000. This settlement was reached without the necessity of actually having to file a lawsuit.
