By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
A jury trial in a lawsuit against the city over an accident at Centennial Hall in 2016 got underway in Sitka Superior Court Monday.
Sandy Sulzbach, her husband and minor children filed the lawsuit in December 2017, seeking damages of more than $100,000 for injuries Sulzbach said she sustained on Oct. 15, 2016, when an Alaska Day decoration being installed in the hall’s auditorium fell on her.
The lawsuit states that Centennial Hall was being decorated for the Alaska Day celebration at the same time that groups were rehearsing for performances on the stage. Decorative chandeliers were being installed “such that they hung from the interior ceiling of the premises above the heads of the unsuspecting rehearsing performers,” the lawsuit states.
It states that Sandy Sulzbach was waiting for her turn to rehearse on stage when the chandelier fell, striking her on her head and upper back. The plaintiffs claim that the city had a “duty to exercise reasonable care in ensuring the premises were safe for invitees within the premises,” including protecting Sulzbach from “foreseeable risks.”
The suit alleges that Sulzbach suffered physical and emotional injury, medical costs, and general damages including loss of quality of life, pain and suffering, emotional distress and anxiety and other related injuries. Citing loss of consortium, it alleges that Sulzbach was unable to perform her duties as wife and mother, and “will in the foreseeable future continue to be unable to perform such work, services and duties.”
The city filed a response to the claim in January 2017, denying that the rehearsing performers were “unsuspecting” of the fact the chandeliers were being hung, and claiming that a number of the statements in the complaint “allege legal conclusions, to which (the city) has no duty or obligation to respond.”
The city also listed “affirmative and additional defenses,” saying the plaintiffs failed to mitigate their damages, if any; the plaintiffs’ own conduct was “comparatively negligent and such conduct should serve to reduce their damages, if any,” and the damages were “caused by negligence and culpable conduct of others, whether parties to this lawsuit or not, over whom defendant has no right to control.”
The city also said the injuries, if any, are “the result of events, accidents or processes (natural or otherwise) unrelated to the collision that is subject of this claim,” and that the claims are “barred ... by the doctrine of sovereign immunity.”
The city asked that the claim be dismissed, and that the city be awarded costs and attorney fees.
The trial is scheduled to last two weeks. Superior Court Judge Jude Pate is presiding. The city is being represented by Timothy W. Bowman, of Walker and Eakes LLC of Anchorage, and the Sulzbachs are being represented by Mark Choate and Jon Choate, of the Choate Law Firm of Juneau.
