$2.4 Million Verdict for Bowling Alley Worker Whose Hand Was Crushed by a Resort Employee's Ball

On April 4, 2019, Park City Mountain Resort, which is owned by Vail Resorts, Inc., held an employee bowling party at Jupiter Bowl in Kimball Junction, a few miles from the resort. The event was approved by the company and paid for with a Park City Mountain credit card.

Amy Herzog worked at the bowling alley. During the party a ball got stuck in a gutter, and she went down the lane to retrieve it. In the adjacent lane, a Vail employee named Joe Ellis was bowling with a showy 360-degree spin move. One of his throws flew over the divider into Herzog's lane and slammed into the back of her left hand, pinning it against the ball she was holding.

Her orthopedic surgeon described the result as a very severe crush injury. The second and third metacarpals, the long bones behind the index and middle fingers, were fractured and extremely fragmented, with soft tissue damage around them. The first surgery took nearly five hours and required roughly 20 screws and pins to rebuild the hand. She needed two more operations to remove the hardware. The damage is permanent: the hand is deformed and stiff, she cannot make a normal fist, her knuckles are enlarged and the fingers sit in a clawlike position, and she faces a high probability of arthritis. She has since worked as a secretary with accommodations.

She and her husband, Shane Herzog, sued Vail Resorts in the Third District Court in Summit County, Case No. 200500069, before Judge Richard Mrazik. Vail argued that the party was an extracurricular outing rather than a company-sanctioned event, that Ellis was not acting within the scope of his employment when he threw the ball, and that Herzog had put herself in a dangerous position.

The jury of eight rejected every one of those arguments. After deliberating for about 90 minutes in November 2022, it unanimously found Vail 80 percent at fault and Ellis 20 percent at fault, assigned no fault to Herzog, and found that Ellis was acting within the scope of his employment. It awarded Amy Herzog $88,000 for medical expenses, $14,000 for lost earnings and $2,250,000 in noneconomic damages, and awarded Shane Herzog $50,000 for loss of consortium, a total of $2,402,000. Her lawyers had asked for about $1 million. Lead trial counsel William J. Hansen told KPCW afterward that $2.25 million "is on the high end."

The court entered judgment on the verdict in December 2022. In May 2023, however, Judge Mrazik granted Vail's motion for judgment as a matter of law on the respondeat superior claim, vacating the jury's scope-of-employment finding, and reduced the award by the 20 percent share attributed to Ellis. The court denied Vail's separate motion for a new trial on the ground that the damages were excessive.

Both sides appealed. On May 15, 2025, in Herzog v. Vail Resorts, Inc., No. 20230549-CA, the Utah Court of Appeals, in an opinion by Judge Ryan D. Tenney joined by Judges Ryan M. Harris and Amy J. Oliver, reversed the judgment as a matter of law. It held that reasonable jurors could conclude that Ellis's spin move at a company event was at least partly motivated by serving Vail's interests, so the scope-of-employment question belonged to the jury. It affirmed the denial of a new trial, finding the damages award supported by the evidence and within the jury's discretion, and directed the district court to reinstate the original judgment with all damages awarded and interest running from 2022.

The Herzogs were represented at trial by William J. Hansen and Kristen C. Kiburtz of Christensen & Jensen, with John E. Hansen and Mitchell T. Brooks. On appeal the counsel block names William J. Hansen, Karra J. Porter, Kristen C. Kiburtz, John E. Hansen and Mitchell T. Brooks.