Supreme Court of Maryland Holds that Negligence by Statute Violation Requires Proof of Proximate Cause

06/09/2025

 Homer Walton, et al., v. Premier Soccer
Club, Inc., et al.,
No. 11, September Term, 2024. Opinion by Gould, J.

Fourteen-year-old youth athlete,
Sydney Walton, while participating in a recreational soccer league, collided
with another player during a routine practice drill causing Sydney to fall into
a wooden perimeter wall, ultimately resulting in a concussion. As a result,
Sydney and her parents (the “Waltons”) collectively brought a negligence claim
against Premier Soccer Club, Inc., alleging that coach Lucio Gonzaga’s
negligence contributed to this concussion through his failure to adhere to
section 14-501 of the Health-General Article of the Maryland Annotated Code (HG
§ 14-501). Both the Baltimore County Circuit Court and the Appellate Court
rejected the Waltons’ claim and granted the Defendants’ motion for summary judgment.
The Waltons petitioned the Supreme Court of Maryland to hear the case.

In order to prove negligence in
Maryland, the plaintiff must show: (1) the defendant owed a duty of care to the
plaintiff; (2) the defendant breached that duty; and (3) there was a legally
cognizable causal relationship between the breach of duty and the harm suffered
by the plaintiff; otherwise known as the “proximate cause” of the injury.
Proximate cause is further broken down into two sub-elements: (1)
causation-in-fact – whether the defendant’s conduct actually produced the
injury – and (2) legal causation – whether the plaintiff’s injury was a
foreseeable result of the defendant’s conduct.

Moreover, where a prima facie case
of negligence is premised upon a showing that the defendant violated a statute,
it is presupposed that the defendant did, in fact, owe a duty to the plaintiff
and subsequently breached that duty by failing to adhere to the statutory
mandate; however, this doctrine is not dispositive and proximate cause must
still be shown. This legal doctrine is known as the Statute or Ordinance Rule
(the “Rule”).

Here, the Waltons relied on the
Rule in making their claim against Premier and Coach Gonzaga for failure to
abide by HG § 14-501, which sets forth guidelines that youth sports programs
must follow in order to have access to local government facilities for their
games and practices. In particular, HG § 14-501(b)(1)
requires that youth sports programs provide information regarding concussions
and head injuries to coaching staff, players, and their parents as a means of
raising awareness of these inherent risks and how to structure practices with
the ultimate goal of lowering the risk of head injuries.

Despite Premier and Gonzaga’s
neglect in distributing the concussion policy material in violation of the
statute, the Waltons were unable to show 1) that this was the cause-in-fact of
Sydney’s concussion and 2) that Sydney’s concussion was a foreseeable result of
not providing the Waltons with the concussion policies. This discrepancy was
further exacerbated by the fact that Plaintiffs’ counsel neglected to include
relevant copies of the concussion policies in their summary judgment
opposition; thereby preventing the Supreme Court of Maryland from taking notice
of the relevant policies in the statute, as the Court may only review the
grounds upon which the trial court relied in granting summary judgment. 

Plaintiffs’ counsel attempted to
argue, alternatively, that the Rule does not require a showing of
cause-in-fact, but merely that the plaintiff was in the class of people that
the statute was intended to protect and that the harm suffered was of the type
that the statute’s drafter meant to prevent; however, the Court emphasized that
accepting this interpretation of the Rule would be antithetical to the
precedent set forth in prior cases.

Ultimately, the Court held that the
Rule specifically requires that plaintiffs show cause-in-fact in a negligence
claim, as to rule otherwise would allow many negligence cases involving
statutory violations to unduly prejudice the defendant and create a windfall
ruling in favor of the plaintiff. Furthermore, the Maryland General Assembly
did not intend for the concussion policies to completely remove the risk of
concussion in youth sports. Concussions are an inherent risk when engaging in
athletic events; thereby negating the Waltons’ claim that, should the Court
consider the concussion policies, cause-in-fact would be proven. Finally, because
the Court is restricted to solely review the facts of the prior cases regarding
the summary judgment record and Plaintiffs’ counsel merely alluded to the text
of the concussion policies, the Waltons failed to include evidence which could
lead a jury to find a genuine dispute of material fact in the case and summary judgment
was proper. 

- Vincent Bedessem, Law Clerk