Wisconsin paintball injury case raises interesting legal issues ...

Over the course of the last 20 years, the popularity of paintball has exploded. In fact, you can find paintball courses all over Wisconsin, and the overwhelming majority of sporting goods stores now carry paintball guns, pellets, masks and other protective gear. In fact, paintball recently took center stage in an interesting personal injury case before the 3rd District Court of Appeals.

According to the complaint, the members of a youth baseball team gathered for a day of paintball on land owned by the parents of one of their teammates back in July 2008.

At the time, the only adult present was the 20-year-old brother of the teammate on whose land the team would be playing paintball. Prior to the boys setting out to play, the older brother expressly warned them to keep their protective masks on at all times.

At some point during the course of the match, one of the teens -- we'll call him Jett -- removed his protective mask while a timeout was called to allow a player to exit the game. Unfortunately, one of Jett's teammates -- we'll call him Alex -- was located 45 yards away and fired a shot that hit Jett directly in the eye. Alex later claimed that he hadn't heard that timeout was called.

Sadly, Jett was left with permanent loss of vision.

Jett eventually filed multiple lawsuits in Polk County Circuit Court, claiming that Alex had acted recklessly and negligently, and that the family that owned the land where the paintball was played was also negligent.

Here, the presiding judge ultimately dismissed the lawsuit against Alex, holding that the applicable section of state law held that players participating in team contact sports are not liable for injuries to others unless they act recklessly or on purpose, and that Alex acted neither recklessly nor purposely.

Jett appealed, arguing that the statute referenced by the circuit court judge was inapplicable because 1) paintball is not a contact sport and 2) there were no organized teams on the day the boys were playing paintball.

The court disagreed with this argument, holding that the contact came from the paintball pellets striking other players, and that nothing under state law required coaches, uniforms or schedules in order to qualify as a team.

The court went on to argue that the evidence showed that Alex had not been reckless: Players were told to leave their masks on, Alex testified that he never heard the time-out, and another teammate testified that Alex was out of hearing range when the timeout was called.

It is worth noting that the personal injury lawsuit against the family that owned the land where paintball was played is still pending.

Source:, Claims Journal, "Wisconsin court rejects paintball injury claims," Todd Richmond, Aug. 2, 2012;

Source: http://www.wisconsinpersonalinjuryattorneysblog.com/2012/08/wisconsin-paintball-injury-case-raises-interesting-legal-issues.shtml

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