FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 31, 2023

Peoria Chiefs Sued By Foul Ball Injury Victim Seeking Immediate Netting Improvements

Professional baseball team continues to host games with no netting above the dugouts, despite ample evidence spanning decades on the need for more protection for fans.

BROOKLYN, NY – A new lawsuit was filed last week against the Peoria Chiefs, a minor league baseball team in Illinois whose ballpark Dozer Field continues to host games with no protective netting above the dugouts, let alone down the foul lines. The lawsuit alleges that this lack of netting puts fans at extreme risk of injury or death by dangerous foul balls and bats leaving the field.

The plaintiff, Sandra Klatt, was struck by a foul ball in the eye at Dozer Park in July 2011 and was hospitalized.

Foul Ball Safety Now, founded by consumer safety advocate Jordan Skopp, first identified Dozer Park and the Chiefs as having the least netting to protect fans in 2021.

“Defendant’s conduct is particularly egregious because it is one of, if not the last, ballpark in both the major and minor leagues to leave the seating above its dugouts entirely exposed. Defendant has offered excuses for its failure to install protective netting, blaming it on COVID- related delays, but two years after first offering that excuse, Defendant still has not taken the simple step of installing netting to protect fans sitting above its entire dugouts,” according to the lawsuit.

The Chiefs general manager told the media in 2021 that the team had “brought in an engineer and did the study on the netting and we were scheduled to have the project done in 2020.” The team blamed COVID for the further delay. Yet, three years later, the Chiefs are still hosting home games without netting above the dugouts. The general manager told the media that “approximately 10 spectators were hit by foul balls in 2019,” including “two or three that needed medical attention and left the ballpark.”

Major League Baseball (MLB) has instructed all minor league teams in its Professional Development League to install netting to the foul poles or as far down the line as possible at each facility, but the league will not enforce the policy until opening day in 2025.

“It is irresponsible and dangerous for MLB and all professional baseball teams to be operating without extensive netting to protect fans. They should address this situation right now, not in 2025. In fact, since professional baseball has known about the serious risks of foul balls to fan safety for at least 50 years since Alan Fish was killed by a foul ball in 1970, they should have installed extensive netting way back then. Instead they’ve operated recklessly for decades, and

thousands of fans have been needlessly injured, including a few fatalities, all of which were preventable if MLB had respected its fans all along,” said Jordan Skopp, who has been leading the conversation for the last four years about the crisis in the minors and the Major leagues regarding foul ball safety.

“How can the St. Louis Cardinals, who pay the salaries of the Peoria Chiefs, allow this dangerous possibility of serious injury to continue in Peoria after what happened in their own stadium in 2016 when a fan was blinded in one eye by a foul ball?” asks Skopp.

The lawsuit was filed in the Tenth Circuit Court in the county of Peoria, with Case Number 2023- LA-0000174, The City Of Peoria, Illinois Ex Rel Sandra Klatt, And Sandra Klatt, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, v. Peoria Chiefs Community Baseball Club, LLC.

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