Live Nation wants fatal stage collapse case dropped
Radiohead concert organizer to argue ‘unreasonable delay’ for dismissing charges in case
More than four years after the Radiohead stage collapse at Downsview Park, one of the companies on trial for the deadly incident wants the case thrown out because the legal proceedings are taking too long.
David McCaskill, the Crown lawyer representing the provincial Ministry of Labour in the case, confirmed that concert organizer Live Nation has applied to have the case dismissed because of “unreasonable delay.” The motion is scheduled to be heard at Old City Hall on Oct. 14 in front of Justice Shaun Nakatsuru, McCaskill said.
The incident in question occurred on June16, 2012, in the hours before a Radiohead concert at the north Toronto park. Scott Johnson, a 33-yearold drum technician who was travelling with the British art-rock band, was crushed to death when the overhang above the stage fell down. Three others were injured. Almost a year later, the Ministry of Labour laid 13 charges against Live Nation, a staging company called Optex and Dominic Cugliari, an engineer from Bolton.
Johnson’s father, Ken, told the Star in a series of emails on Friday that his family was enraged by the application to have the case dismissed. Johnson’s parents live in northern England, and Ken said he would like to travel to Toronto to attend next week’s hearing but can’t afford it.
“I have to be Scott’s voice in this case,” he said. “Any sympathy I had has gone and we get more and more angry at the deflection of blame . . . They seem to have forgotten that Scott is now dead for a very long time, which is highly offensive to us.”
Live Nation declined to comment on Friday because the matter is part of an “ongoing litigation.”
The trial began last year and was originally scheduled for 15 days in June 2015 and 15 days that November, Ken said. That bled over into another15 days of hearings that were spread out over April, May and June of this year. Earlier this summer, McCaskill said he expects the trial to be finished by January, after the de- fendants present their cases.
“Believe me, we know it is taking a long time,” Ken said.
“I am sure that no one planned to kill Scott on that day, but if the case is not resolved, how do we know how to ensure it never happens again?”
The charges in the case involve alleged offences under the province’s Occupational Health and Safety Act. The ministry alleges that Live Nation failed to ensure the stage structure was designed and built to support all likely loads and forces or that it was adequately braced. It also accuses the company of failing to make sure there were no excessive loads on the structure.
Optex Staging, meanwhile, was charged with four counts of failing to ensure the stage was being built in a safe manner.
Cugliari, the engineer and only individual charged, is accused of endangering a worker.
Neither Optex nor Cugliari could be reached for comment on Friday.
After the Radiohead stage collapse, Janet Sellery, a performance health and safety consultant who works in Stratford, began consultations with the provincial government to improve safety at such events. The result, released in 2013, was guidelines released by the Ministry of Labour that lists safety concerns for those setting up concert venues in the province.
Sellery told the Star last summer that the guideline is an example of how there’s a growing willingness to place safety at the heart of this corner of the entertainment industry.
But for Johnson’s parents, Ken and Sue, the long trial after their son’s death has been difficult. But even so, Ken said they would feel that cutting proceedings short before any verdict is reached would be an injustice to Johnson’s memory.
“For us our life has ended as dramatic as that might sound . . . We only seek the facts as to how the accident happened,” Ken said.