Photo Credit: Live Nation
Live Nation and others are facing a negligence and breach of contract lawsuit from three individuals who say that they were “dragged, trampled, and smashed” during a crowd rush at the Lovers & Friends festival last May.
San Bernardino residents Carla and James Thomas, along with an Arizona-based plaintiff named Aaliyah Aguilar, just recently submitted the firmly worded complaint to a California federal court. In addition to Live Nation, the allegedly injured Lovers & Friends attendees named as defendants the happening’s security company and medical-services provider, besides Ticketmaster’s Front Gate and Las Vegas Festival Grounds owner Phil Ruffin.
As reported – and captured on video – nearly one year ago, a stampede occurred at the well-attended event when panicked audience members attempted to flee the open-air venue after hearing what were at the time believed to be gunshots. While it subsequently emerged that no firearm had been discharged at the function (which featured performances from Usher, Ludacris, Lil Jon, and others), multiple individuals spoke of the resulting injuries and received medical attention.
The latter group ostensibly includes the plaintiffs in the newly filed action against Live Nation, which “had a duty to implement and execute a security plan to keep” Lovers & Friends attendees safe, per the legal text.
According once again to the concise complaint, two of the filing parties (one of whom was a minor at the time) “sat down on the concrete ground…to relax their legs a bit” between performances. The allegedly “foreseeable” and preventable crowd rush occurred soon thereafter, the suit maintains, when a “sea of people” is said to have “surged toward” the litigating victims.
Others in attendance “pushed, smashed, dragged, kicked, stepped on, trampled and crushed to the ground” the plaintiffs, who are said to have “felt frightened, shocked, anxious and light-headed during the entire ordeal,” per the action.
Despite this adversity and the plaintiffs’ claims that they unsuccessfully “screamed for help from the event organizers and security” and “screamed for emergency medical care for their injuries,” the three attendees in question were ultimately “able to extricate themselves away from the rushing crowd and chaos,” exiting the venue, according to the suit.
Live Nation and the other defendants “failed to employ adequate, properly trained, monitored, and supervised reasonable security, safety and medical provision measures,” reads the complaint levied by the trio of former Lovers & Friends supporters.
Moreover, the same defendants’ “negligence includes, but is not limited to, insufficient security, insufficient training and supervision, insufficient crowd control, insufficient medical provision, and insufficient management and organization,” according to the document.
Aside from allegedly suffering “serious injuries” that required “emergency medical care,” the plaintiffs are said to have grappled with “general damages” (stemming from “fear for their safety, fear of death, anxiety, and depression”) and diminished earning capacities.
Last month, Live Nation and Ticketmaster moved to compel arbitration in a class-action lawsuit filed by allegedly shortchanged Swifties following the Eras Tour fiasco, and the companies are reportedly fending off a separate class-action suit in Canada over the “artificially inflated” price of Drake tickets.