ST. LOUIS (Legal Newsline) – The United States is immune from liability in a lawsuit brought by a woman who alleges she tripped and was injured at a fair at the Gateway Arch in St. Louis.
That’s the ruling of federal judge Audrey Fleissig, who entered her decision June 15 in Charity Shonk’s personal injury lawsuit. She found the Federal Tort Claims Act shields the government from liability, as its discretionary function exception prohibited Shonk’s claims.
The United States argued three theories:
-The St. Louis police officer who diverted fair-goers onto a grass area was not a federal employee;
-A private entity would not be liable because Shonk was a licensee at the park, not an invitee, so there was no duty to warn of any hazard; and
-The National Park Service’s maintenance of the Arch park is a “discretionary function” protected by sovereign immunity.
“Discretionary conduct is not confined to the policy or planning level,” Fleissig wrote. “Rather, the focus is on the nature of the conduct rather than the status of the actor.
“Here, according to NPS policy, the decision whether to warn Arch visitors of objects such as the lid was clearly discretionary.”
According to the complaint, Shonk was departing the Gateway Arch grounds following a fireworks show on July 4, 2019. As Shonk was walking, her foot became lodged beneath an unmarked concrete slab covering an electric panel in the ground, she says.
The slab was black in color and completely unmarked with no signs, barricades, fencing, or other warnings to alert fairgoers to the danger posed, the suit says. Shonk alleges that her momentum carried her body forward, causing her to suffer a gruesome ankle injury.
Shonk was taken by ambulance to Mercy Hospital, where her ankle was put in a splint, the suit says. Subsequent x-rays and evaluation revealed Shonk had suffered a fracture of the distal fibula and medial malleolus and surgery was performed the following day on July 5, 2019, the suit says.
The suit says Shonk's injury was so severe that she required multiple cortical screws and a plate to rebuild her joint. Shonk alleges that due to her injury, she is unable to resume a full work week, a situation affecting both her present earning capacity and future wages and benefits.