Jury: NCAA not to blame in ex-USC football player’s death | Ap

LOS ANGELES (AP) — In a verdict that would have an effect on numerous claims by athletes who sue sports activities organizations for head accidents, a Los Angeles jury on Tuesday rejected a lawsuit looking for $55 million by the widow of a former USC soccer participant who mentioned the NCAA failed to guard him from repeated head trauma that led to his loss of life.

Matthew Gee, a linebacker on the 1990 Rose Bowl-winning squad, endured an estimated 6,000 hits as a school athlete, legal professionals for his widow mentioned. They alleged these impacts brought about everlasting mind injury, and led to cocaine and alcohol abuse that ultimately killed him at age 49.

The NCAA, the governing physique of U.S. school sports activities, mentioned it had nothing to do with Gee’s loss of life, which it mentioned was a sudden cardiac arrest introduced on by untreated hypertension and acute cocaine toxicity. A lawyer for the NCAA mentioned Gee suffered from many different well being issues not associated to soccer, resembling liver cirrhosis, that will have ultimately killed him.

Lots of of wrongful loss of life and private damage lawsuits have been introduced by school soccer gamers in opposition to the NCAA prior to now decade, however Gee’s was the primary one to succeed in a jury. The swimsuit alleged that hits to the pinnacle led to persistent traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative mind illness recognized by the acronym CTE.

Choose Terry Inexperienced instructed jurors in Los Angeles Superior Courtroom they “made historical past” within the first case of its variety.

The consequence might function a warning to legal professionals making ready to take comparable instances to trial, mentioned Dan Lust, a sports activities regulation legal professional and professor at New York Regulation College. Earlier than the trial, he had mentioned {that a} Gee victory might have opened the floodgates in opposition to the NCAA. Now, the NCAA has extra leverage in future instances.

“Any plaintiff’s legal professional goes to suppose twice earlier than placing all of the chips within the desk and pushing them to the center and saying, ‘We’re going to take our case to trial and see what occurs,’” Lust mentioned. “You’re going to be a lot much less inclined to take that danger from a cost-benefit perspective.”

Alana Gee choked up as the decision was learn and had tears in her eyes afterward. She instructed one in every of her legal professionals that she didn’t perceive how the jury got here to that call, however thanked the seven ladies and 5 males personally as they left the courtroom. She declined to remark afterward.

“We really feel deep sympathy for the Gee household proper off the bat,” Will Stute, the NCAA legal professional, mentioned afterward. “However we really feel like this verdict is a vindication of the place we’ve taken in all these instances, which is the science and medication in Matthew Gee’s circumstance didn’t help causation.”

Stute had argued that medical proof is just not clear on what causes CTE, and what the impacts are from that illness.

Attorneys for Gee mentioned CTE, which is present in athletes and navy veterans who suffered repetitive mind accidents, was an oblique reason behind loss of life as a result of head trauma has been proven to advertise substance abuse.

Alana Gee had testified that the school sweethearts had 20 good years of marriage earlier than her husband’s psychological well being started to deteriorate and he turned indignant, depressed and impulsive, and commenced overeating and abusing medication and alcohol.

The NCAA mentioned the case hinged on what it knew on the time Gee performed, from 1988-92, and never about CTE, which was first found within the mind of a deceased NFL participant in 2005.

Gee by no means reported having a concussion and mentioned in an utility to play with the Raiders after graduating that he had by no means been knocked unconscious, Stute mentioned.

“You’ll be able to’t maintain the NCAA accountable for one thing 40 years later that no person ever reported,” Stute mentioned in his closing argument. “The plaintiffs need you in a time journey machine. We don’t have one … on the NCAA. It’s not truthful.”

Attorneys for Gee’s household mentioned there was little doubt that Matt Gee suffered concussions and numerous sub-concussive blows.

Mike Salmon, a teammate who went on to play within the NFL, testified that Gee, who was workforce captain his senior 12 months, as soon as was so dazed from successful that he could not name the following play.

Gee was one in every of 5 linebackers on the 1989 Trojans squad who died earlier than turning 50. All displayed indicators of psychological deterioration related to head trauma.

As with teammate and NFL star Junior Seau, who killed himself in 2012, Gee’s mind was examined posthumously at Boston College’s Persistent Traumatic Encephalopathy Heart and located to have CTE.

Jurors weren’t allowed to listen to testimony about Gee’s deceased teammates.

Alana Gee’s legal professionals had argued that the NCAA, which was based in 1906 for athlete security, had recognized about impacts from head accidents because the Thirties however failed to teach gamers, ban headfirst contact, or implement baseline testing for concussion signs.