Can I Sue Over Music Festival or Concert Injuries in Ohio?

The summer music festival season is here, offering a wide variety of musical entertainment. While concert and festivalgoers just want to have fun, these events can present a risk of serious injuries.

If you suffered concert injuries in Ohio, you may be able to take legal action to recover damages, including the cost of medical care, pain and suffering, and more. Establishing liability for these injuries is often complicated, which is why you need an experienced lawyer.

Friedman, Domiano and Smith’s Cleveland-based personal injury attorneys know how to evaluate these claims and build a strong case. Our goals are the same as yours: recovering full compensation and holding at-fault parties accountable.

How You Could Get Injured at a Concert

There are many ways you could get injured at a music festival or concert. Some of the common types of accidents at concerts include:

Slips and Falls

There can be numerous slip and fall hazards at these events. For example, a damaged stairway railing could cause a fall on or off a staircase. Wet floors could cause people to slip, such as in a restroom. If it rained the night before, grassy areas could become muddy, making it hard to walk without falling. Spectators could fall from balconies or from seating areas that are high off the ground.

Fires

Fires can cause injuries whether the event is indoors or outdoors. However, fires at indoor concerts can be particularly dangerous because it is harder for people to exit the building quickly. Depending on the cause of a fire and the materials used to build the walls, flames could spread quickly.

Sometimes fires are caused by cooking equipment at a concession area. Electrical problems due to old equipment or poor property maintenance could also spark fires.

Crowd Surges

Crowd surges at concerts have led to some notable and horrific situations. In fact, one of the worst disasters at a U.S. concert happened in Cincinnati in 1979. A total of eleven people were killed, and 26 others injured, when a crowd waiting outside of the Riverfront Coliseum surged into the venue.

More recently, in 2021, hundreds of concertgoers at the Astroworld music festival were injured and 10 people were killed when hundreds of people there started pushing to get closer to the stage.

Crowd Surfing Injuries

While crowd surfing is incredibly dangerous for the people doing it, others in the crowd can also suffer injuries. If a crowd surfer falls on you in a bad way, it could cause catastrophic injuries. You could get knocked into someone else or into a fixed object.

Motor Vehicle Accidents

The parking situations at some venues are more organized than others. However, if you are parking in a grassy area, it can be difficult to know where to go. There are often pedestrians everywhere. Unfortunately, drivers are often not as careful as they should be. If they are leaving the show, they may also be under the influence of alcohol.

What Are Common Injuries at Music Festivals?

These are just some of the many types of injuries that could occur in the accidents referenced above or other types of accidents at concerts:

• Crush injuries
• Broken bones, particularly bones in the arms and legs
• Head injuries
• Traumatic brain injuries
• Severe burn injuries
• Lung damage from smoke inhalation
• Back and spinal cord damage
• Severe bruising
• Lacerations
• Internal injuries
• Dehydration
• Heat exhaustion
• And more

If you suffered these or any other injuries at a concert or music festival in Ohio, give us a call to discuss possible legal options. Another party may be responsible, and you may be eligible to recover compensation.

Who Could Be Held Liable for Concert Injuries?

Sometimes the answer is as simple as an individual, or multiple individuals. For example, if you were assaulted or a crowd surfer fell on you, these people may be liable for any injuries that occurred.

However, the answer to the question of liability for concert injuries is often much more complicated than that. Is the venue responsible? Is the company that provided security responsible? Was there a failure to maintain the premises in safe condition?

These are all reasons why injured festivalgoers may need legal assistance from an experienced attorney. Below, we discuss some of the parties that could be at fault for injuries at concerts.

Venue Owners

Ultimately, the owners of venues are responsible for the safety of those who enter these venues. While other parties involved in the event may bear fault, liability may reach all the way to the top. It depends on how the injury occurred and what parties were involved in creating or allowing the hazardous condition to exist.

Music Acts/Bands

A music act or band could be held liable if they were allowed to design the stage and some part of that design caused an injury. Artists could also be held liable if they incited the crowd to violence.

Maintenance Staff

Poor maintenance could lead to fires, slip-and-fall accidents and other dangerous situations.

Company That Provided Security

Poor security or lack of adequate security can expose concertgoers to a higher risk of assault.

Entity That Organized the Festival or Concert

It is possible that poor planning of the event contributed to or caused a hazardous condition that led to your injury. For example, maybe parking was poorly organized, and this caused the crash that injured you.

How Do You Prove Liability for Concert Injuries?

When you go to a music festival or concert, you are considered an invitee. Property owners and other parties involved in the event may have a duty to take reasonable precautions to keep the property safe. For example, they may need to regularly inspect the property to check for hazardous conditions and take steps to mitigate any dangers found. At a minimum, property owners need to warn people about conditions that may be considered unreasonably dangerous.

Property owners/venue owners could also be held liable for failing to provide adequate security to protect people from assault or other criminal activity. This is considered a reasonable step to prevent invitees from getting hurt.

One of the challenges with proving liability is that the tickets may include a liability waiver. However, there are exceptions when waivers cannot shield other parties from liability.

What Should I Do After Suffering an Injury at a Music Festival or Concert in Ohio?

The first step after any personal injury should be to seek medical treatment. Festivals often have first-aid stations, and they may be able to provide immediate treatment before you are transported to the hospital.

You should also report the incident to event management staff. They may have an incident report you can complete so you can explain what happened and why you suffered an injury. This report serves as the first official documentation of the incident and can help link your injury to the event.

However, sometimes injuries are so severe, that victims are unable to file an incident report. They may be unconscious or need immediate transport to the hospital. In these situations, medical treatment is the most important thing.

You should also contact an experienced lawyer as soon as you can. If you do not act quickly, important evidence could get lost. There is also limited time to take legal action. Your attorney needs time to gather evidence and contact witnesses. He or she also needs time to determine liability.

Call Friedman, Domiano and Smith After a Concert Injury

When people get injured at a concert or music festival, they may automatically assume the injury was their fault. However, sometimes dangerous conditions on the premises may have presented an unreasonable risk of injury.

That is why victims should never assume they do not have a case without first contacting an experienced lawyer who understands how liability can be proven. Call Friedman, Domiano and Smith. Let us review what happened to determine if you can seek compensation.

An initial case review is free, so there is no financial risk in calling us. There are also no upfront costs to pay and no fees while we work on your case.