A karate expert in Japan who broke a haunted house worker’s jaw with a kick in 2011 has lost his lawsuit against an amusement park.
The man, who admitted to drinking before entering the haunted house at Toei Kyoto Studio Park in Kyoto in 2011 while travelling with his colleagues, had argued that the park should have warned visitors that humans acted as ghosts and it should have protected its staff better.
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The karate expert was startled when a park worker, dressed as a ghost, stepped forward to frighten him. The man, who has not been named, kicked the “ghost” in the face and later said it was a reflex.
Damn. That’s a weak argument.
I don’t know spit about Japanese tort rules, but I would think trying to claim negligence on the part of the park would be essentially dead in the water from the start.
Reflex or not, the fact that he’d been drinking puts the onus directly on him.
His counter-argument is that they should never have allowed him in as he was too drunk.
That’s not necessarily true in all countries. If anything, a trained fighter needs to be able to control their reflexes. It’s like a soldier walking around drunk pointing a loaded gun everywhere.
I didn’t say it was a good counter-argument. He did lose the lawsuit after all.