Pitre v. Employers Liability Insurance Corporation

Nine-year-old Anthony Pitre was fatally injured when a baseball-throw game participant's wind-up struck him in the head while he stood near a concession stand at a fireman's fair operated by the Thibodaux Fire Department; his parents (plaintiffs) sued the fair's insurers (defendants) for negligence. An expert witness testified that the primary risk at such stands was ricocheting baseballs, that he had never seen ropes or barriers used to separate throwers from bystanders at this type of stand, that insurance safety engineers consistently approved operating without such barriers, and that he personally excluded young children from playing because they typically couldn't knock down the targets. The trial court found the Fire Department negligent, and the defendants appealed.