VENTURA : Woman Files Suit Over Stray Golf Ball

A 35-year-old San Luis Obispo woman has sued Ventura County’s Saticoy Regional Golf Course, claiming that a golf ball shattered her car windshield, knocking her unconscious and showering her with glass.

Yvette Vaca and her father, Peter Vaca, filed suit Tuesday in Ventura County Superior Court, charging the golf course and county with negligence.

The suit alleges that Yvette Vaca was driving her father’s 1983 Mercury Cougar on Wells Road about 3:45 p.m. May 12 when a golf ball flew through holes in a netting screen between the nine-hole course and the road. The ball penetrated the windshield and struck Vaca’s left cheek, knocking her unconscious, said her lawyer, Steven Pell. When she came to, Vaca found that she had managed to pull the car onto the shoulder but that glass particles had cut her face, Pell said.

Pell said Vaca was treated for a concussion and cuts and still suffers from headaches and flashbacks.

The suit contends that the driving range is too short, the screen inadequate and poorly maintained, and that the incident caused Vaca mental, physical and nervous suffering. It asks for unspecified damages, attorney’s fees and an injunction ordering the golf course to correct the condition.

Blake Boyle, county recreation supervisor, said the golf course managers, who lease the land from the county, raised the screen height to 60 feet three years ago and refurbished it with netting containing holes one-quarter the size of a golf ball.

“I don’t think it’s very possible for the balls to go through the netting unless the netting is torn or ripped,” he said.

Course manager Bob Talbot said that the netting is not torn, but that the ball might have traveled over the top of the netting. He said Vaca was not knocked unconscious, according to an incident report written by his staff that day.