Adair Claims Track Negligence, Files $500,000 Suit : Injured Jockey Says Fog Conditions Should Have Forced Los Alamitos Race Cancellation

Jockey Robert Adair, Los Alamitos Race Course’s all-time stakes-winning rider, filed a $500,000 suit in Orange County Superior Court Tuesday, claiming race track negligence led to the December, 1984, accident in which he suffered multiple fractures to his right shoulder and numerous facial lacerations.

The suit, which lists Los Alamitos Race Course, Hollywood Park Operating Company and Horseman’s Quarter Horse Racing Association as defendants, claims that Los Alamitos Race Course was negligent to allow the race to be run when fog conditions were present. The suit further charges a breach of oral contract that guarantees safe riding conditions for jockeys.

(Los Alamitos Race Course is owned and operated by the Hollywood Park Operating Company. The Horseman’s Quarter Horse Racing Assn. leases the Los Alamitos facility for its annual quarter horse winter meeting from the HPOC. The HQHRA was the lessee when the accident occurred.)

Adair, 41, says the accident caused him to suffer permanent injuries that have impaired his riding ability. Adair, who was the national leading money-winning quarter-horse jockey from 1968 to 1973, has not ridden since the accident more than six months ago.

“Bobby Adair’s doctor has said he does not believe Bobby will ever be able to ride again,” said Dennis Christianson, Adair’s attorney. “He has been in daily physical therapy, but he still can not raise his right arm above his head.”

The December 1, 1984, accident occurred during the sixth race, when jockey John Creager’s horse, Face In The Crowd, ran into a fog bank on the track and bolted to his left, tossing Creager and bumping into Adair’s horse, Truly A Bunny. That bump jarred Adair out of the saddle.

Adair was tossed from his horse and then stepped on by several other horses approximately 100 yards from the finish line in the 400-yard race. Adair was taken to Los Alamitos General Hospital, where he remained for eight days.

Adair fractured his right shoulder in 21 places and suffered severe facial lacerations, which required reconstructive plastic surgery to repair holes in his lower lip, jaw and chin.

On December 12, Adair was moved to Centinela Hospital in Inglewood where he underwent surgery to his right shoulder. After an eight-day stay at Centinela, Adair had a hospital bed moved to his home. He was confined to that bed until February.

“I can’t raise my right arm to comb my hair,” Adair said. “I snapped the main bone between the shoulder and the elbow and had 21 breaks in my shoulder. They put a long pin and two screws in there that were suppose to be permanent, but now they’ve decided that’s got to come out.”

Adair is scheduled for further surgery on his shoulder July 12.

According to Christianson, the suit charges that “unsafe conditions for the race occurred when a fog bank hung over a portion of the race track” and that the Board of Stewards should have cancelled or postponed the sixth race because of the fog.

A Los Alamitos Race Course spokesman, who spoke on the condition his name not be used, said that a jockey has the option not to ride in a race right up to the time of the race. If he feels unsafe conditions are present, he may withdraw from the race and risk a fine.

The spokesman also said that fog is not unusual at the race track during the winter months, and the Board of Stewards have cancelled races as a result of fog.

Hollywood Park Operating Co. and the HQHRA could not be reached for comment.