Last year, there had been 6 amusement park injuries that required hospital care, and more than 150 cases of bumps and bruises. This year, there were no serious injuries at all, and the number of minor injuries like bumps and bruises was lower at 147. According to Cynthia Wick, who is the director of the New Jersey Division of Codes and Standards, this year’s injury free summer at amusement parks was a result of several factors. These include training for employees on specific rides, and better coordination and monitoring of employee training. There have also been more detailed inspections of rides over the last few years. 

These measures have helped bring about some control over those runaway injury numbers. In 1998, there were 16 serious injuries, and the following year that number dropped to 12. Not that tragedies have been unheard of since then. In 2005, a 14-year-old girl drowned at a theme park in Ocean City. The same year, a mechanic who was inspecting a ride in Lacey Township, suffered an electric shock, and died. Since then, however there have been no fatalities in our theme parks.

As a consumer, you can do your bit to avoid injuries in a theme park.

• Avoid old and poorly maintained rides.
• Observe the operator to see if he is competent.
• Avoid carnivals and amusement fairs, and other temporary rides that look shabby or old.
• Follow ride operators’ instructions.

Marriott International has distanced itself from a defense adopted by one of its franchise hotels in a premises liability lawsuit involving a woman who was raped on hotel premises, after outrage from customers and women's groups.  

The hotel, the Marriott Hotel and Spa in Stamford, Connecticut has withdrawn the defense its lawyers employed in the lawsuit.  In 2006, the unidentified woman was raped at gun point in her mini van in the hotel parking lot. The rapist held the woman at gunpoint, and raped her in front of her two children, who were then 5 and 7 years old. He threatened the woman that he would assault her kids if she didn’t cooperate.

After that nightmarish experience, the woman filed a premises liability and negligent security lawsuit against the hotel. Earlier this month, lawyers for the hotel's insurance company filed papers alleging that the woman acted carelessly in failing to ensure her own safety and the safety of her kids. It's hard to understand what the woman could have done to protect herself or her kids here. The rapist – who has since been found guilty and is serving a 20-year term - had a gun, and threatened to rape her kids if she didn’t cooperate.

Outrageous premises liability defenses are not rare, and New Jersey premises injury lawyers come across these all the time. Because a victim has to prove that the property owner was negligent, premises owners have been known to pull out all stops to limit liability, by trying to proving that the victim caused the injury through his/her own negligence.

Marriott has deservedly had its name sullied with this defense. The hotel has lost not only its goodwill, reputation, and very likely, tons of business from horrified customers, but possibly, the lawsuit too.