The part you're missing.
I understand that some of you are under the impression that an alligator even hissing at your child is an attack, but it's not. If two alligators were "chasing" a child with the intent to actually grab it, either that man needs to be in the Olympics or the alligators were engaged in posturing rather than attacking. Or the child was all the way in the water, which you did not mention? That would slow the father down even further. Gators don't generally chase down prey on land, and they tire of trying to sprint. Humans don't run too quickly in water, where the alligators would have easily caught up to the child if they were racing towards it.
That's nice. From the legal perspective an assault is "Something that puts someone in reasonable fear of imminent physical contact that is harmful or offensive." While alligators can't be charged under assault, alligator posturing, from a legal perspective, counts as an attack. Disney was on notice that the gators were chasing kids. Whether they wanted to eat them or toss them around like beach balls doesn't matter. Disney should have done more than what they did. Putting up a sign would have cured the liability. They didn't put up the signs so they are liable. Why is that so hard for you to understand?
The "pet alligator" comment has been mentioned in this thread already... by me. Hand-feeding alligators does make them liable, as does creating a safe breeding ground for alligators in the old water park.
Great. So Disney's liable. /thread.
I'm not sure why you're trying to make an argument that a "stay away from the water" sign with alligators and snakes mentioned is enough.
Because the case law that I was going back and for with presence earlier says it's enough. Seriously. He claimed that as long as the animals are wild there is no liability. I found a case where an appeals court in Georgia held a resort liable for a woman being eaten by a gator because the resort knew about the gators on the property. He found the Georgia Supreme Court overruled the appeals court. I pointed out that the reason the Supreme Court overruled the court of appeals was that there was undisputed testimony that the woman that got eaten knew about the gators.
Now apply that to this case. It is undisputed that Disney knew about the gators. But there's no evidence to suggest that the couple knew about the gators. Oh there's all this "Well everybody knows there's gators in Florida." True. But I wouldn't expect gators at a well maintained billion dollar a year resort. Alligators were once hunted to near extinction in Florida. That means they're populations can be controlled. And between this boy getting snatched and his body being found at least 5 gators on Disney property were killed. If that was a nightly occurrence the gators that survived would have their natural fear of humans restored.
If I am walking through a garden area at that resort, and a snake bites me, can I argue that I stayed away from the water and still got bitten?
You are
totally misunderstanding the legal framework here. The issue isn't whether or not you were at fault for getting bitten by the snake. The issue is whether or not the landowner knew about the poisonous snakes and didn't tell you about them. If you were warned "There are poisonous snakes in this park" and you decided to come visit the park anyway that would be what is known as an "assumption of risk." Have you ever gone snow skiing and had to sign one of those waivers that says "If you break your leg we're not liable?" Same idea. Even the people telling you when you rent your skis "Ski at your own risk" is enough to put you on notice about the risk. Now you may argue "Well everybody should know about the risk anyway." Maybe. But to be legally covered the person who's inviting you on their property needs to warn you about known risks. And besides, it's simply the nice decent thing to do.
Obviously Disney knows there are snakes, and their sign made me think the snakes were only near the water. Do you see why I say that the signs don't magically remove all liability? The same goes for startling a sunning alligator (on land and not necessarily near the water). I'm not near the water. Disney can say they warned me all they want, but the sign would be very insufficient. It would also not be enough if I lost a few fingers to an alligator snapping turtle.
I see that you
simply do not understand the legal argument you are trying to refute.
I will
try to explain it again. Presence was right when he said that in general there is no liability if a wild animal attacks someone on your property. That legal principle is called ferae naturae. But ferae naturae doesn't hold if you 1) had actual control of the wild animal (pet, zoo, etc) or 2) knew the wild animal was on your property. Now if you know the wild animal is own your property you still aren't liable if the person who was injured are killed also knew. (In the case of the toddler it would have been enough if the parents knew.)
That's the legal standard. The case law has been posted on this earlier in the thread.
I've seen gators at Sea World, too, btw. I also have seen sharks in the ocean, scorpions in the desert, bear prints in the woods, and gang members in Baltimore. If I'd been harmed by any of the aforementioned, I would hope my family wasn't awful enough to sue. It wouldn't be my fault for getting harmed, but it also would not be everyone else's fault for not putting a sign up to warn me.
Well I hope if you owned Sea World and you knew about gators being on the property and you and set up a nice beach front area near a lagoon where you knew there were gators that
you would not be awful enough to do that without putting up warning signs or otherwise warning the people you were inviting to your property! Seriously that would be a sick and godawful thing to do. Being sued isn't the most evil thing a person can do. But needlessly putting children in danger by setting a situation that draws families
with children to a known danger and not warning anybody while profiting off of it? That's just evil.
Having a sign up that says "caution: deadly thing that may possibly harm you is present" does not always remove liability from the person putting up the sign. There are a number of regional cases involving "Beware of Dog" signs where the homeowner is still liable for someone lawfully on their property being harmed, despite the sign being up. There are other cases that have found precisely the opposite. Your eye-rolling assertions that this is cut and dry are unfounded.
You do understand that ferae naturae only applies to
wild animals right? No, I guess you don't. You are trying to argue about something that you clearly haven't taken the time to research even though all of the answers you need to know how off base your arguments are exist right here in this thread.
Once again, if it's a
wild animal then you are generally not liable unless you know specifically that the wild animal is on your property (not just that it might be on it) but you can escape liability if the person injured or killed also knew. And it is cut and dry whether you realize it or not.
