Cuyahoga Falls is not immune from a lawsuit brought by the parents of a boy injured six years ago on a Natatorium diving board, a unanimous Ohio Supreme Court ruled Tuesday.
The parents of Michael Hawsman are seeking more than $25,000 in damages for the knee injury the Cuyahoga Falls boy suffered after a fall in May 2006.
The lawsuit was filed in 2009.
A year later, Summit County Common Pleas Judge Judy Hunter dismissed it. She found past appellate rulings that grant cities immunity based on an exception to state law regarding indoor swimming facilities.
Falls attorneys relied on a previous court case involving the death of a boy in a Cleveland swimming pool in which the Supreme Court in 1998 granted the city immunity. The 9th Ohio District Court of Appeals reversed Hunter’s ruling in August 2011; the city then took the case to the Supreme Court, which upheld the appeal.
The case was sent back to common pleas court.