Talk about a gift from the Tooth Fairy. A Bronx school is trying to placate a 12-year-old kid who took a soccer ball to the mouth with a cool $20,000 in an attempt to ward off a lawsuit, according to a published report.
It was supposed to be a dodgeball game, but the teachers at Intermediate School 219 didn't have the soft squishy balls that, you know, wouldn't hurt if they whacked your head.
Seeking alternatives, they used soccer balls, which, as we've learned, do indeed hurt when pummeled into one's cranium – or mouth, as was the case with Shane Reese.
Reese had just gotten some heavy duty repair work done on his teeth so he was sitting out of last year's dodgeball game, which involved some 100 odd students and a poorly lit gymnasium, reports the Daily News. Unfortunately, he got involved anyway when a wayward soccer ball smashed into his mouth, ruining all the work he had done.
"Soccer balls were flying all over the place. There was an issue of lack of supervision," Shane's attorney, Mark Weinberger, who filed the lawsuit in Bronx Supreme Court, told the News. "He wasn't supposed to be playing and he was struck in the face."
For its part, the Education Department says it thinks dodgeball is inappropriate. There's no formal ban, but spokesman William Havemann, who had no comment on Reese's lawsuit, told the paper that the practice has been discouraged since 2006.
A judge will determine if the settlement is sufficient.
