5 year old's touch sends on-loan sculpture crashing to floor. Kansas City bills parents 132K
Video of the incident:
http://www.newser.com/story/260706/parents-get-132k-claim-after-kid-topples-sculpture.html?utm_source=part&utm_medium=uol&utm_campaign=rss_top
Wrangling 5-year-olds can be challenging. Failing to do so can apparently be expensive. Or so learned a Kansas couple, who say they may be on the hook for a $132,000 sculpture their young son knocked over. ABC News reports that while at the Tomahawk Ridge Community Center in Overland Park for a May 19 wedding reception, the 5-year-old was caught reaching toward the sculpture by surveillance cameras; "Aphrodite di Kansas City" toppled over and fell. Then the other shoe dropped, in the form of an insurance claim for $132,000—the piece's list price—from the company that insures the city. Sculptor Bill Lyons says he spent roughly 2 years creating the glass piece and that his inspection of it revealed damage to the head and arms. It is "beyond my capabilities and desires to rebuild it," Lyons says.
"You’re responsible for the supervision of a minor child ... your failure to monitor could be considered negligent," the letter from the insurance company read in part. Mom Sarah Goodman counters that the whole scenario was dangerous, and not because of her child. "He didn’t maliciously break that. It fell on him. It was not secure, it was not safe—at all." As for what he was doing, she tells the Kansas City Star "he probably hugged it ... because he’s a loving, sweet nice boy who just graduated from preschool." Overland Park says the piece was on loan and it was obligated to file an insurance claim, and the insurance company was subsequently obligated to contact the family. They say they're hopeful their homeowner's insurance policy will cover the situation, reports KSHB. (This woman says she didn't ruin an $89,000 artwork but rather increased its value.)
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The boy can be seen hugging the base of the sculpture named “Aphrodite di Kansas City” by local artist Bill Lyons, the Kansas City Star said. He attempts to hold it up as it begins to lean forward but can’t stop it from falling.
“This glass mosaic torso is laying on the ground and someone is following me around demanding my personal information,” the boy’s mother Sarah Goodman told WGN.
The family soon learned of the piece’s hefty price tag.
“‘Maybe this is like 800 or something.’ No, it’s $132,000!” Goodman told reporters. “I’m sorry, we’re finished here.”
The Goodmans said they received a letter from the City of Overland’s insurance company accusing them of negligence for not monitoring their children, according to WGN.
In response, the mother said, “My children are well-supervised, but all people get distracted.”
http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2018/06/15/kansas-boy-topples-aphrodite-sculpture-132k/
= new reply since forum marked as read
But this is a different generation, and nobody wants to take responsibility for anything. I keep asking myself, why do these people even have kids? Some of these mothers are the same ones who get their kids' teachers fired because their little snowflakes aren't getting straight A's in school.
The negligence is by the city’s community center. The Goodmans should fight this claim.
I have to laugh when I hear all the people who are CERTAIN that they were never naughty children who touched something they shouldn't have.
And all the parents who never once took their eyes off their children.
Yeah, right.
But the fact is that that facility had a legal responsibility for the safety of all its patrons, including the children who they knew would be there. They were very lucky that child wasn't seriously hurt. The burden was on the facility to make sure that statue was secure, and to put a warning sign up and to cordon it off. They failed miserably.
you're a shitty parent because that happened. You should have had your kid in a straitjacket. It's your fault.
Children are part of the community, last I checked. 
Sounds like many people on DU have never been around 5 yr old boys!! You can be two feet behind them and stuff happens.
All that thick mosaic is fairly heavy + requires a lot of epoxy which has weight. A lot depends on how thick the mosaic is, how thick the glass is, how thick that metal frame is, and what's under all that mosaic. Can't know just by looking at this statue.
I agree the pedestal looks a bit inadequate and the wisdom of having a supposedly near $100K in value statue in an area used for parties without it being somehow enclosed seems questionable at best.
And I suppose a kid that young knocking it over provides fairly decent evidence it wasn't bottom-heavy ENOUGH unless he totally climbed up onto the top 1/2 
I will never forgive you for rejecting my piece.
I spent five years on a two story 30 ton steel work called “Homage To Jenga” which I specifically designed for the competition for an installation in the atrium of the new treatment center for blind hyperactive children - and you turned it down!
I will never forgive you.
I knew it would come to this. Now I will have to burn my identity and start over.
See you in the game.
bottom
This one, of course, is second.
%26imgrefurl%3Dhttp://resaws.co/autism-harness-leash.html%26h%3D400%26w%3D300%26tbnid%3DQvK_R1ZqvlAUjM%26tbnh%3D259%26tbnw%3D194%26usg%3D__zC52Ke9eywaOsMg5aeVbUM1NbaQ%3D%26docid%3D25b8SgqC9bXZ6M%26itg%3D1&ved=0ahUKEwiN2M6CsNjbAhVRSq0KHSk6CWIQ8g0ILTAB&usg=AOvVaw3EqFxjOyJ8ajJVaZyd2wqVNot every child needs it . Some are over energetic at an age where they can not understand . Of course by 5 , the boys age, I would think most developing should understand
A teacher friend of mine told me a lot of losers wait until the school can teach them hands off and sit down behave 
Are they COMPLETELY to blame--arguably no, but every bit as irresponsible as the parents who let their child run unattended at my home causing $275 worth of destruction. By your argument the parents could have allowed their child to destroy every and anything not nailed down in my home. Hell, why not.
My gawd, if this is your idea of responsible parenting, I am very thankful you are not my neighbor.
This is one of the potential problems with free-ranging children.
THIS.
As a kid, my parents ALWAYS had me by their side at ALL times whenever I was with one of both of them. I see kids now-a-days, and their parents aren't even near or around them, and it's very alarming.
A friend told me a few weeks ago that she was loading groceries into her jeep, and there was a young child standing at the rear of her jeep bumper. She said she looked around and saw no one. So, she said the took the child (About 5 she said) into the store to the manager's desk. The manager made an announcement describing the child's look/what he was wearing. My friend said 3-4 minutes later, a women came strolling slowly to the manager's desk holding a giant Slurpee. She said the manager told this woman that the boy had been missing for about 10 minutes, and why she didn't notice? My friend said the woman said my son looks okay--he's fine. My friend said the manager went in on this woman. She looked at the manager, Slurpee in hand, and pulled her kid by the arm and left. She said the woman didn't really seem to care--didn't even say thank you for returning her child to her. Wow
The situation I described was very different than the situation in Kansas, but the bottom line is that parents really must watch their children closely at ALL times.
Here is the entire piece:
The base, the "column," and the statue are all one piece.
I don't understand why this piece was not roped off. While that might not have stopped the child from approaching it, that might have discouraged most people from getting within "hugging" distance.
and was looking at this brilliant, vivid, pallet-knife oil painting and I was wondering if the paint had actually dried (local artists show). I compulsively reached out to the edge of the canvas frame just to see - and a guard yelled out, "Don't touch the paintings!"
He followed me everywhere I went after that to the embarrassment of my family.
Anything of value displayed in public has to be watched and protected (insured) - there are impulsive dumbasses like me and children everywhere in America! 
Last edited Sat Jun 16, 2018, 01:47 PM - Edit history (1)
I rolled on the floor too
It's always the best topic to start a flamewar.
Every year at Christmastime she displayed her Three Kings in a high-traffic and unstable place. Every year there would be damage because when you have a house full of people things happen. Every year she'd play the "Woe is me" card. I quit caring about it early on.
The same went for her complaining about kids spilling a drink in her downstairs (basement) family room and staining the carpet. She'd banish the kids downstairs and the adults would be upstairs. And she'd give them red Kool-aid to drink (!!!) Gosh, what could go wrong???
Now I have my own grandchildren. I've always had a few "Grandma's House Rules", but sometimes things happen. Lessons are learned and life goes on. (My husband is the one who will invariably spill something or scratch something. And then like a little kid he'll deny it. 
)
The park should've put up a sign, a fence, or bolted those rocks down!
They could have been hurt!
Any act of willful misconduct of a minor which results in injury or death to another person or in any injury to the property of another shall be imputed to the parent or guardian having custody and control of the minor for all purposes of civil damages, and the parent or guardian having custody and control shall be jointly and severally liable with the minor for any damages resulting from the willful misconduct.
Subject to the provisions of subdivision (c), the joint and several liability of the parent or guardian having custody and control of a minor under this subdivision shall not exceed twenty-five thousand dollars ($ 25,000) for each tort of the minor, and in the case of injury to a person, imputed liability shall be further limited to medical, dental and hospital expenses incurred by the injured person, not to exceed twenty-five thousand dollars ($ 25,000). The liability imposed by this section is in addition to any liability now imposed by law.
See Cal. Civ. Code § 1714.1(a) (2005).
I don't know if her state has a similar statute, but it definitely has one less statue.
Thanks
That's what Musk calls his flamethrowers, LOL!
To one of us for touching ANYTHING when we were out kept us kids in line.
But that didn't stop Homer.
