Jury Awards $2.1M To Woman Who Fell From Rose Garden Balcony

Vancouver resident Tammy Matson, who in December '02 broke her ribs, pelvis, arms and  shoulder after falling 42 feet from a Rose Garden balcony, has "won $2.1[M] from a Multnomah County [OR] Circuit Court jury," according to Aimee Green of the Portland OREGONIAN. Twelve jurors Friday decided that former Rose Garden operator Oregon Arena Corp. (OAC) and Matson were "equally responsible" and awarded Matson half of the $4.25M in damages they determined that she suffered. Matson argued that there were "no warning signs telling patrons of the Blazers game not to sit on the 3-foot-wide ledge." But attorneys Dan Knox and Jill Schneider, who represented OAC during the two-week trial, said that "no reasonable person would have hopped up onto the ledge or the railing ... and used it as a seat." Knox and Schneider added that "no other patrons have had trouble since the arena opened" in '95. Knox: "Twenty-five million people have gone through the Rose Garden and never had this happen to them." The defense also argued that Matson was "affected by the five beers she reportedly told a medical responder she had drunk" (Portland OREGONIAN, 4/29).