A Canadian man claims he permanently lost vision in his right eye after he was struck by an errant tee shot while playing golf at a prestigious resort in Lake County, alleging he was parked on a golf cart path that the business knew to be susceptible to \u201ccrossfire.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brian Richmond and his wife, Kristel, filed the lawsuit against SJ Mission Inn, LLC, which does business as Mission Resort & Club, in the Fifth Judicial Circuit Court of Lake County on August 8.<\/p>\n
The Richmonds, who are from Canada, visited the Mission Resort & Club in November 2023. Located at 10400 CR 48 in Howey-in-the-Hills, the resort features two 18-hole golf courses, dining, lodging, and several amenities for guests.<\/p>\n
On November 3, 2023, Mr. Richmond claims he was playing a round of golf with his brother \u201cand others\u201d at the El Campe\u00f3n golf course on the property.<\/p>\n
While his brother was replaying a shot that he hit \u201cinto the water hazard\u201d on the eighth hole, Richmond says he was \u201cstationary in a golf cart\u201d that was parked \u201con the cart path adjacent to the drop zone area.\u201d<\/p>\n
As his brother was setting up, Richmond claims he was struck in the eye by a \u201cball that veered left\u201d from a golfer on the ninth hole tee area.<\/p>\n
The impact on Richmond\u2019s right eye caused \u201ccatastrophic injuries,\u201d according to the complaint, including a traumatic ocular injury that resulted in a \u201ccomplete and permanent loss of vision.\u201d<\/p>\n
Richmond\u2019s attorneys allege that their client was parked in a \u201ccustomary and reasonably foreseeable location for a golfer to be while a playing partner replayed a shot.\u201d<\/p>\n
They further allege that the business knew golfers \u201croutinely used the area adjacent to the 8th hole water hazard to replay shots,\u201d and that it either \u201cdesignated the area adjacent to the 8th hole water hazard as a drop zone\u201d or knowingly permitted its use \u201cin that manner,\u201d despite the \u201cknown risk of crossfire from the ninth tee.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c[Mission Resort & Club] failed to implement reasonable safeguards, including physical barriers, signage, course design modifications, or other measures to prevent injury or warn invitees such as [Mr. Richmond] of the foreseeable risk of injury,\u201d according to the complaint.<\/p>\n
Richmond\u2019s attorneys accuse the business of negligence, of \u201cfailing to implement safety measures,\u201d and of failing to \u201cwarn of the danger,\u201d despite having \u201cactual or constructive notice.\u201d<\/p>\n
They allege the company breached its duty to its customers by \u201cdesigning, constructing, and\/or operating the eighth and ninth holes in a configuration that created a foreseeable crossfire hazard.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c[Mission Resort & Club] further breached that duty by failing to modify, reconfigure, or otherwise alter the layout and flow of the course, or to implement any protective safety measures, despite having actual or constructive knowledge of the foreseeable risk,\u201d reads the complaint.<\/p>\n
The lawsuit claims the \u201cnegligent design, construction, and\/or operation of the course,\u201d is what led to Richmond\u2019s \u201cserious and permanent injuries,\u201d including the complete loss of vision in his right eye.<\/p>\n
The complaint also cites a count of \u201closs of consortium\u201d for Mrs. Richmond, referring to a loss of Mr. Richmond\u2019s \u201ccompanionship, society, affection, services, and consortium,\u201d as a result of the incident.<\/p>\n
The Richmonds are seeking compensatory damages in excess of $50,000, exclusive of interest, costs, and attorneys\u2019 fees. They are represented by Tonelli Law of Winter Park.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Canadian man claims he permanently lost vision in his right eye after he was struck by an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120450,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,77376,14059,77377,99],"class_list":["post-120449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-howey-in-the-hills","tag-lake-county","tag-mission-resort-club","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}