Russo v. Lake Buena Vista Communities, Inc.
This text of 721 So. 2d 772 (Russo v. Lake Buena Vista Communities, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.
Opinion
Thomas RUSSO, and Robin Russo, his wife, Appellants,
v.
LAKE BUENA VISTA COMMUNITIES, INC., Appellee.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fifth District.
Steven M. Meyers, of Meyers, Mooney & Meyers, Orlando, for appellants.
John W. Smith and Frank D. Hosley, of Roth, Edwards & Smith, P.A., Orlando, for appellee.
*773 GRIFFIN, C.J.
Thomas Russo ("Russo") and Robin Russo ("Robin"), his wife, (collectively "the Russos"), appeal an adverse summary final judgment on their claim for damages allegedly suffered in the Walt Disney World theme park.
Thomas Russo, a forty-eight-year-old diabetic suffering from chronic complications of peripheral vascular disease aggravated by smoking and advanced heart disease, underwent the amputation of his lower left leg in 1992. In August of 1994, Russo planned a trip to Walt Disney World with his family. Because of the prolonged walking he anticipated, he called the Walt Disney World reservation office to reserve an electric scooter.
Russo, his wife, and their two-year-old handicapped daughter, Tiffany, arrived at the Magic Kingdom parking lot at approximately 9:00 a.m. and paid a fee to park their van. Using his prosthesis, Russo boarded a tram and then walked to the ticket transportation center, where he understood he would be able to rent the electric scooter. A Disney employee advised him, however, that electric scooters were available only inside the Magic Kingdom. Russo was not interested in a manual wheelchair because of his heart condition, so Russo and his family walked approximately 100 yards to take a ferry boat to the entrance of the Magic Kingdom and to the wheelchair/electric scooter rental facility.
As Russo entered the Magic Kingdom, he noticed a wet feeling in his prosthetic sock, along with a slight burning sensation. He realized that he had a water blister on the bottom of his stump which had broken. For that reason, after he rented the electric scooter, he took off his prosthesis and placed it across his lap. He remained in his scooter and kept his prosthesis off during his entire visit to the Magic Kingdom, with the exception of standing one time to use a urinal.
At the end of the family's visit in the park, sometime between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m., they returned to the same wheelchair rental facility. During the course of the day, Russo's stump had become swollen, and when he reached the rental facility, the stump was still swollen, he still had the water blister, and he also had some pain in the stump. In fact, his stump had swollen to the point where he did not believe he could safely reattach his prosthesis and walk the incline to the monorail.
Because of these medical problems, and because of his fears of trying to reattach his prosthesis, Russo claims that he advised an employee at the wheelchair rental facility of his dilemma. Specifically, he advised the employee that his stump had swollen and that he did not think he could reattach his prosthesis and walk to his car:
And I asked the girl, is it all right if I take the scooter out to the tram because I'm having trouble with my stump, and I raised the stump up to her, and she said, "No, no, you can't, you can't take it past this point," and she pointed to like a little fence they have there that separates the, where you can't get in I guess without a ticket.
So I said, "Well, you don't understand the problem," I said, "I can't put my prosthesis back on right now I don't think," I said, "I think I'm going to have to take this out to the front." I said, "I tell you what, I left you a $20 deposit, have somebody follow me out there and bring it back and you can keep the 20 bucks."
She says, "No, no," she says, "I'm sorry, you can't."
At no point did the employee offer any other options for Russo to get to his car, including the use of a manual wheelchair.
Russo claims he then spoke with a manager at the rental facility. Russo asked the manager if he could use the scooter to get to his car. He advised the manager, "... I'm having a problem with my stump, I got a blister on it and it's swolled up now." The manager refused to allow Russo to take the scooter to the car. Russo, now angry, advised the manager that reattaching his prosthesis and walking to his car was probably going to be very painful and cause further injury to his leg:
I looked at the guy and I said, "Don't you understand my problem? I can't even get out of this park, what are you talking about me going to another park for?" I said, "Do you understand what I'm saying?" *774 I said, "I'm having trouble right now and I need to get out to the car, out to the tram at least."
He says, he repeats the same thing to me again, about well, you know, I can get you a free one at anotherif you want to go to Sea World, you know, and then, you know, then I start cursing at the guy ... I just said, "Don't you understand F-ing English," you know, I got really hot about it, I said, you know, "What the F- is it going to take," you know, "to make you understand," so I said, "What you're doing," I said, "you're forcing me to put the leg back on and walk out of the park," and I said, "It's going to be very painful," I said, "it's probably going to do more damage," I said.
He said, he got really like cocky, "Well, you should have made those arrangements before you came."
Exasperated, Russo turned to his wife, and told her "Listen, let's get out of here before I have a homicide on my hands." Robin remembers the altercation creating a scene:
It got loud and people were staring and a little crowd developed and the man didn't understand.
He never offered us any other alternative to get out of the park. He neverthere was nothing offered. There was no other option to go.
He said, "You can't take the scooter past this point. That's the way it is, sir." And that was the conversation.
Although Russo was in obvious pain, he wanted "to get the hell out of there" and opted to leave without requesting medical assistance, a decision he later regretted:
... I never thought it would escalate into what it did escalate into. If I did know that I would have threw myself on the floor right at that spot and demanded they get me out of the park with a stretcher or whatever they wanted to do but I never thought it was going to come to this.[1]
Russo stood, and using his body weight, forced his swollen and blistered stump into his prosthesis. He and his family then walked to the monorail, where he had to use the handrails to pull himself up the ramp leading to the monorail. Upon exiting the monorail, he experienced excruciating pain while walking down the exit ramp.
By the time Russo exited the monorail facility, he was in such pain that he had to stop and rest for about fifteen minutes. He then resumed his walk on his prosthesis to the tram, using his daughter's stroller as a walker. After exiting the tram, Robin brought the car around and Russo removed his prosthesis. Russo had a hole in the bottom of his stump and approximately two inches of blood had pooled in the prosthesis.
Because Russo was unwilling to drive back to his home in Boca Raton in his condition, and because he was not able to take care of his handicapped daughter while his wife drove, the Russos remained in Orlando overnight. Robin is a registered nurse, and she helped Russo clean and ice his wound.
Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI
Related
Cite This Page — Counsel Stack
721 So. 2d 772, 1998 WL 821766, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/russo-v-lake-buena-vista-communities-inc-fladistctapp-1998.