€15,000 whiplash compensation claim awarded to Rod Stewart fan at concert
A concert-goer has been awarded €15,000 in damages after she suffered whiplash injuries at a Rod Stewart concert in Dublin in 2005.
Sally Price, a lifelong fan of the 64-year-old singer, was struck by a football that Stewart had kicked towards the audience at the Point Depot concert. A tradition that the rocker has been doing at his concerts for over 30 years, Stewart kicked dozens of autographed footballs into the crowd, much to the delight of his fans.
The court heard that on this occasion, Stewart miskicked one of the balls, which hit the rigging above the stage at the venue and then came down on the fan’s head at such a pace that it knocked her over and left her feeling dazed for some time. Judge Jacqueline Linnane at the Circuit Civil Court awarded the sum to her after hearing that she continues to suffer whiplash-like injuries years after the incident took place, right into the present.
The concert promoters, MCD Promotions Ltd of Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin, were slapped with the bill after the judge decided that the claimant had suffered concussion as a result of the incident.
The singer’s management team gave her four autographed footballs as an apology, two of which she gave to the doctor who treated her. Stewart, who is a keen Celtic supporter and who once trained as a professional footballer, also met with Mrs Price.
“I have always been a fan of his music and the singer came down to see me as I was being treated,” she said. “I would have been so pleased to have met him on a happier occasion.”
Hugh O’Keeffe, counsel for Mrs Price, told the court that such a reckless act could have been avoided and that the potential danger of the entertainer’s actions were foreseeable, leaving the concert promoters liable in negligence for the whiplash-like injuries to Mrs Price’s neck and shoulders.