A wrongful-death suit involving a fatigue endurance contest has developed into a showdown over whether the organizer, a Texas auto dealership, had a duty to protect the participants from the effects of sleep deprivation.

Richard Vega, 24, killed himself in September 2005 shortly after dropping out of the annual “Hands on a Hardbody” contest at Patterson Nissan of Longview. He had stood with his hand on a pickup truck for two days in the hope of winning the vehicle.

The dealership has moved for summary dismissal of the suit filed by Vega's widow, arguing that it did not owe him a duty of care because “there is no reason that Patterson should have anticipated his suicide as a result of conditions created by the HOHB contest.”

Those conditions, according to plaintiff Chalala Gutierrez, included a competitive atmosphere, the availability of Monster “high energy” drinks, and contest rules which precluded the competitors from getting any sleep.

“From a societal perspective, placing a duty on an entity like Patterson to be the guarantors of the well-being of voluntary contestants is absurd, and will have far-reaching effects on other businesses and enterprises,” Patterson warns in its motion, which is set for a hearing May 27 in Gregg County District Court.

But Gutierrez, quoting the testimony of a human fatigue expert, contends that “Hands on a Hardbody” was “effectively 'an experiment on sleep deprivation'” and should therefore have been conducted with “the precautions required of federally sponsored sleep/stress research,” including a “fatigue management system.”

“[B]ased on the 'broad evidence for suicide in people who are sleep deprived,' the contest triggered duties in Patterson similar to the duties born[e] by those who conduct human research experiments on sleep deprivation,” Gutierrez says in a brief opposing summary judgment.

The prize in “Hands on a Hardbody” went to the contestant who endured standing beside the truck with a hand on it longer than any other. After 48 hours, Vega walked away from the contest, broke into a Kmart across the street and, with a shotgun taken from the store, shot himself in the head.

Much of the plaintiff's case appears to rest on fatigue expert Dr. Martin Moore-Ede, who has concluded that Vega's suicide was a foreseeable result of the contest. “[T]here is ... an enhanced risk, that is predictable, in placing a group of individuals, including Mr. Vega, into a contest and sleep depriving them … that could result in death or injury,” he testified in a deposition.

The defense insists there is nothing in Moore-Ede's testimony “to suggest that the risks and/or conditions [of the contest] constitute a 'substantial factor' leading to the suicide at issue here.”

But evidence of previous “bizarre, aberrant behavior” by previous contestants might be enough to get the case to a jury. Contest manager Jan Maynard testified that one contestant thought he was in Oklahoma, another thought he saw plants on the hood of the truck, and another thought she saw her husband “smooching” another woman.

Vega's widow says he also suffered hallucinations during the contest and “expressed paranoid and delusional thoughts, such as that other contestants were out to get him.”

When contestants like Vega dropped out, “Patterson ignored them, failing to provide even obvious and common-sense safety measures, such as an escort, debriefing by a trained expert, and/or a mandatory, supervised sleep period,” Gutierrez argues.

By Matthew Heller
5/17/08