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One example of a window guard is seen here. The bars are designed to prevent people -- most often small children -- from falling out windows and injuring themselves on the ground below. A lawsuit filed Monday faults a Corvallis apartment-management company for allegedly failing to put a window-fall protection device in a third-story window that a woman fell from.

(U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission)

A Corvallis woman who was sleeping in a bed next to an open window last summer when she fell out and plummeted three stories to the ground has filed a $230,000 lawsuit against an apartment management company.

Shelbi Macholz faults Principle Property Management for failing to install window guards that might have prevented her injuries, according to her lawsuit filed Monday in Lane County Circuit Court. Macholz suffered fractures to her pelvis, tailbone and lower back.

Macholz tumbled from the apartment about 1 1/2 blocks from the Oregon State University campus at 4:48 a.m. on July 27, 2014, according to her suit. She was 22 years old at the time.

The suit is exceptionally rare. It highlights the dangers of open windows not just for small children, but for adults, too.

By far, most window-fall victims are 5 years old or younger. Nationwide window-fall prevention campaigns have been almost entirely directed at children.

Window falls by adults aren't unheard of, however. Sleepwalking specialists have treated patients who've fallen or jumped from windows or balconies.

After Macholz fell, she was rushed to Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center in Corvallis and later Legacy Emanuel Medical Center in North Portland, her suit states. She was dosed with painkillers, blood-clotting agents and other medications, according to her suit.

Macholz seeks up to $80,000 for medical costs, plus up to $150,000 for pain, suffering and interference with her ability to enjoy life.

Principle Property Management is based in Eugene, but managed the Corvallis apartment building where Macholz was sleeping. A representative from the company didn't immediately return a request for comment Tuesday.

Macholz's suit faults the company for allegedly failing to keep the apartment building "safe for normal and reasonably foreseeable uses" and for allegedly "failing to warn (Macholz) of the latent danger of fully opening a window on the third floor of an apartment building."

Despite a big push in recent years to get property owners -- especially rental property owners -- to install window guards or other window-fall protections, government agencies rarely require them. The city of Corvallis doesn't require apartment building management companies to install the devices in their windows, across the board.

In New York City, where high-rise apartments are the norm, building owners with three or more apartment units are required to install window guards or other protections if there are children 10 years or younger living there.

Salem attorney Brady Mertz is representing Macholz. (Read the lawsuit).

-- Aimee Green

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