Football Player's Brain Injury Case Against School District and Helmet Maker Settles for $4.88 Million

On Sept. 14, 2007, Scott Eveland, a 17-year-old linebacker for Mission Hills High School in San Marcos, California, collapsed on the sideline during a game in the first half. Bleeding inside his brain caused extensive damage. Surgery that night saved his life, but he was left severely disabled and in need of constant care. His mind remained alert while his body was badly impaired.

His family sued the San Marcos Unified School District in Vista Superior Court in 2008. The first theory was that emergency staff delayed getting him to a hospital, but that theory fell apart as evidence came in. The case changed in late 2010, when a student trainer testified at deposition that Eveland had told the team's athletic trainer, Scott Gommel, just before kickoff that his headache was so bad he could not focus his eyes, and asked to sit out the first quarter. She said she heard head coach Chris Hauser tell Gommel that he would play whoever he chose. At least two more witnesses later testified that Gommel had told them much the same account in the days after the collapse. Gommel and Hauser both denied those conversations in their depositions and said they did not know Eveland had been suffering symptoms.

Robert Francavilla was Eveland's lead attorney, with David Casey Jr. as co-counsel. The litigation ran almost four years and produced more than 250 depositions, which Casey described as more than he had ever heard of in a case of this kind. After repeated continuances, a trial was set for January 2012, but the case went quiet while the lawyers conferred. Negotiations included the district, the county Office of Education, which oversees a joint powers authority that insures school districts, and the office's excess liability carrier.

The helmet maker Riddell had settled separately several months earlier for $500,000. The district's settlement of $4.375 million was finalized before Judge Thomas Nugent in Vista on March 9, 2012, bringing the combined recovery to just under $5 million before attorney fees and costs. Nugent, who had presided over the case since 2008, told the courtroom he understood there was some good news, if there could be good news in a case like this.

The parties issued a joint statement calling the settlement a compromise in Eveland's best interests, with the money intended to help pay for his future medical care. The family agreed that the settlement did not suggest the school's coaches, trainers, administrators or staff intentionally contributed to the injury, and the district admitted no fault.

Francavilla said afterward that Eveland's health was improving. He had completed the requirements for his high school diploma, and where it once took three or four people to help him stand, it now took one or two. He could communicate with an iPad or a keyboard when someone supported his arm.