HARTFORD, Connecticut – Several former professional wrestlers who claimed in lawsuits that World Wrestling Entertainment failed to protect them from repeated head injuries are taking their case to the United States Supreme Court.
A lawyer for the former fighters, most of them stars in the 1980s and 1990s, filed a request Wednesday asking the Supreme Court to hear appeals from lower court decisions that dismissed the cases. The lower courts said the lawsuits were frivolous or started after the limitation period expired.
Among the plaintiffs were Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka, Joseph “Road Warrior Animal” Laurinaitis, Paul “Mr. Wonderful” Orndorff, Chris “King Kong Bundy” Pallies and Harry Masayoshi Fujiwara, known as Mr. Fuji.
The fighters said they suffered repeated head injuries, including concussions that led to long-term brain damage, and accused WWE of knowing about the risks of head injuries, but did not alert their fighters.
WWE, based in Stamford, Connecticut, continues to deny the allegations and says the lawsuits are without merit, a spokesman said on Thursday.
Snuka and Fujiwara died in 2017 and 2016, respectively, and both were diagnosed with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, after their deaths, according to their lawyer. Pallies and Laurinaitis died in 2019 and 2020, respectively, of undisclosed causes. Other plaintiffs have dementia and other illnesses, the suit says.
More than 50 ex-fighters have filed lawsuits against WWE. In September, the 2nd Circuit Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City dismissed the dispute. The court upheld the 2018 decisions of federal judge Vanessa Bryant in Connecticut, who said there was no evidence that the WWE knew that concussions or blows to the head during the fights caused CTE.
Former fighters’ lawyer Konstantine Kyros, who lives in Hingham, Massachusetts, criticized the decisions and said the ex-fighters were “deprived of their fundamental rights as American citizens, including the right to appeal”.
Kyros said the 2nd Circuit court rejected previous appeals because final decisions were not made in all cases. After Bryant made the final decisions in 2018, Kyros appealed again. But he said the 2nd Circuit also rejected those appeals, saying they were filed too late according to a new legal precedent set by the US Supreme Court.
In his 2018 decision, Bryant also criticized Kyros for repeatedly failing to comply with court rules and orders and ordered him to pay WWE legal fees – more than $ 500,000.
Unlike football and hockey, where players have suffered similar injuries, WWE matches involve scripted and choreographed movements by WWE, making the company directly responsible for the fighters’ injuries, the lawsuits claim.
The National Football League and National Hockey League were also sued by former players who suffered concussions and other head injuries. The NFL closed a deal with $ 1 billion and the NHL with $ 18.9 million.