Mr. Sanderson’s lawyers said Ms. Paltrow had a “duty to ski safely” but instead negligently struck Mr. Sanderson, a downhill skier who had the right of way, in the back, causing him permanent harm. Court documents say that his injuries include “permanent traumatic brain injury, 4 broken ribs, pain, suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, emotional distress and disfigurement,” and add that Mr. Sanderson “will continue to suffer injuries and damages in the future.”
Ms. Paltrow was involved in a hit and run, Mr. Sanderson’s lawyers said, leaving him alone, then denying or covering up the fact that she caused the crash.
“Before this crash, Terry was a charming, outgoing, gregarious person,” one of the lawyers, Lawrence D. Buhler, said in his opening statement on Tuesday. “After the crash, he’s no longer charming.”
On Wednesday, Wendell Gibby, a radiologist and one Mr. Sanderson’s doctors, testified that Mr. Sanderson “had an abrupt change of personality and of his functioning,” after the accident, adding that “the record is very clear: He had changes in his behavior and interpersonal relationships.”
Ms. Paltrow claims that she was downhill from Mr. Sanderson and therefore he was responsible for the collision. According to court documents, Mr. Sanderson, who was 69 at the time, had told his doctor about a year earlier that he was blind in his right eye and that vision in his left eye was declining.
According to court documents, Mr. Sanderson held a news conference three years after the episode and demanded that Ms. Paltrow pay him millions of dollars. On Tuesday, Mr. Owens said that Mr. Sanderson was “aging” and “obsessed with this lawsuit,” and that medical witnesses would show that his brain damage stemmed from before the accident.
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