Fan injured at lawn mower race loses Supreme Court case

WHITTEMORE -- The Michigan Supreme Court has waved a checkered flag and ruled in favor of a lawn mower racing club in a dispute over injuries suffered by a spectator in the northern Lower Peninsula.

Michele Compau fractured a wrist when she tripped over a railroad tie while trying to avoid a mower that was coming through a flexible fence at Whittemore Inn Race Club in 2010. She subsequently had five surgeries.

In a lawsuit in Iosco County, Compau argued that the track’s design had created an unreasonable risk of harm for spectators. The Supreme Court, however, said the railroad tie may have been risky but still was “open and obvious” — a key legal standard in Michigan.

The Supreme Court last week reversed a decision by the state appeals court and reinstated a ruling by an Iosco County judge. Justice Richard Bernstein, the lone dissenter, said he would have rejected the club’s appeal.

Compau and her husband, Todd, “have failed to present evidence to support that the lawn mower races were so distracting as to preclude application of the open and obvious danger doctrine,” the court said in a one-page order.

The appeals court, in a 2-1 decision, had ruled in favor of the couple on a different theory of ordinary negligence.