NW Lawyer - October 2014

Top 10

With October come thoughts of changing leaves, cooler, maybe even frosty nights, and the end-of-the-month celebration of all things spooky, scary, and sometimes imply sophomoric. This month’s “Top Ten” is a quick look at some cases ( provided by the World Wide Web) that will give you chills, or possibly just leave you scratching your head.

1. Rice v. Utah Department of Corrections (2001). A Utah prisoner named Robert Rice filed for extraordinary relief, claiming the prison acted in violation of his right to practice his religion by failing to provide a “vampire” diet.

2. Durmon v. Billings (2004). In Louisiana, a customer who visited a haunted corn maze sued the owner and owner’s insurer after she fell and broke her leg when an actor with a chainsaw approached her.

3. Grant v. Grant (2012). A potential criminal and tort case from Pennsylvania where, at a family Halloween bonfire, Janet Grant spotted a skunk and told her son Thomas to fetch a shotgun and shoot it. When he returned, Janet Grant shined a flashlight on the animal while her son shot it. It was only then that they discovered that little Tommie had just shot his eight-year-old cousin in her black-and-white Halloween costume. Fortunately, his cousin survived with only a wound to her shoulder and abdomen.

4. Strombovsky v. Ackley (1991). For 12 years, the Ackleys reported that their house was haunted to local news outlets and Reader’s Digest. When they put the house up for sale, they did not disclose this to potential buyers. Strambovsky put in an offer and down payment of the house. When he learned about the home’s ghoulish reputation, he brought an action to rescind the offer and for damages, claiming fraudulent misrepresentation. While the court dismissed the claim of fraudulent misrepresentation, the court opted against a strict interpretation of caveat emptor and allowed the contract to be rescinded because even “the most meticulous inspection and the search would not reveal the presence of poltergeists at the premises or unearth the property’s ghoulish reputation in the community.”

5. Rabindranath v. Wallace (2010). Peter Wallace, 24, was returning on a train with fellow Hibernian soccer fans in England — many dressed in costume. One man was dressed as a sheep and Wallace thought it was funny to constantly flick his lighter near the cotton balls covering the sheep guy — until he burst into flames. Friends then made the matter worse, trying to douse the flames by throwing alcohol on the flaming man-sheep.

6. Dickson v. Hustonville Haunted House and Greg Walker (2009). Glenda Dickson, 51, fell out of a second-story window left open at the Hustonville Haunted House, owned by Greg Walker. Dickson was in a room called “The Crying Lady in the Bed” when one of the actors came up behind the group and started screaming. Everyone jumped in fright and Dickson jumped back through an open window that was covered with a sheet. She landed on a fire escape and then fell down some stairs, breaking four vertebrae.

7. Maryland v. Janik (2009). Sgt. Eric Janik, 37, went to a
haunted house called the House of Screams with friends and
when confronted by a character dressed as Leatherface with a
chainsaw (sans the chain, of course), Janik pulled out his service
weapon and pointed it at the man, who immediately dropped
character, dropped the chainsaw, and ran like a bat out of Hal-
loween Hell.

8. Kentucky v. Watkins (2008). As a Halloween prank, restaurant manager Joe Watkins of the Chicken Ranch in Paris, Kentucky, thought it was funny to lie in a pool of blood on the floor. After seeing Watkins on the floor, a patron went screaming from the restaurant to report the murder. Watkins said that the prank was for another employee and that he tried to call the woman back on her cellphone. Under Kentucky law, a person can be charged with a false police report, even if he is not the one who filed it. The police charged Watkins for causing the woman to file the report.

9. Kansas City Light & Power Company v. Trimble (1926). From the opinion: “A shapely pole to which, twenty-two feet from the ground is attached a non-insulated electric wire. On the shapely pole were standard steps eighteen inches apart; about seventeen feet from the ground were telephone wires, and five feet above them was a non-insulated electric light wire. On Halloween, about nine o’clock, a bright fourteen-year-old boy and two companions met close to the pole, and some girls dressed as clowns came down the street. As they came near, the boy, saying, ‘ Who dares me to walk the wire?’ began climbing the pole, using the steps, and ascended to the telephone cables, and thereupon his companions warned him about the live wire and told him to come down. He crawled upon the telephone cables to a distance of about 10 feet from the pole, and when he reached that point a companion again warned him of the live wire over his head, and threatened to throw a rock at him and knock him off if he did not come down. Whereupon he turned about and crawled back to the pole, and there raised himself to a standing position, and then his foot slipped, and involuntarily he threw up his arm, his hand clutched the live wire, and he was shocked to death.”

10. Ferlito v. Johnson & Johnson (1993). Yet another flaming sheep story: “Plaintiffs Susan and Frank Ferlito, husband and wife, attended a Halloween party in 1984 dressed as Mary (Mrs. Ferlito) and her little lamb (Mr. Ferlito). Mrs. Ferlito had constructed a lamb costume for her husband by gluing cotton batting manufactured by defendant Johnson & Johnson Products (JJP) to a suit of long underwear. She had also used defendant’s product to fashion a headpiece, complete with ears. The costume covered Mr. Ferlito from his head to his ankles, except for his face and hands, which were blackened with Halloween paint. At the party Mr. Ferlito attempted to light his cigarette by using a butane lighter. The flame passed close to his left arm, and the cotton batting on his left sleeve ignited. Plaintiffs sued defendant for injuries they suffered from burns which covered approximately one-third of Mr. Ferlito’s body.” NWL

Douglas Pierce practices in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and is a member of the law firm of James, Vernon & Weeks. He is a member of the WSBA Editorial Advisory Committee. He can be reached at dpierce@jvwlaw.net.