Stewart Sutton has successfully represented many parents whose children have been seriously injured at daycare centers in Montgomery County, Maryland.  His clients’ children have suffered broken bones, permanent scarring, lacerations, and near amputation of fingers due to the neglect and inattention of daycare centers.   

The common theme for many of these personal injury cases is that the daycare centers allow the children to play with age-inappropriate climbing and sports equipment.  For example, many daycare centers operate summer camps and weekend sports classes in which older children receive instruction in gymnastics, such as the balance beam and parallel bars.  The gymnastic equipment is kept in the daycare center’s multi-function room.  The problem is that daycare centers often do not use a physical barrier to prevent young children from attempting to climb on the gymnastics equipment.    

Daycare centers have a duty to exercise reasonable and ordinary care in supervising children.  The daycare center breaches its duty when its employees allow children access to gymnastic apparatus that is not age appropriate.  Young children will be injured when some or all of the following conditions occur:  

a.  There are an insufficient number of staff members in the indoor play area to prevent children from climbing on gymnastics equipment;

b.  The staff members take no measures to prevent children from climbing on the gymnastics equipment;

c.   The gymnastics equipment is not appropriate for the development of the child’s fine and gross motor skills;

d.   The gymnastic equipment is not scaled in proportion to the child’s size; and

e.       It is unreasonably dangerous to allow the child to climb onto the gymnastic equipment due to the child’s age, height, lack of upper body strength, developing bones, lack of gymnastic training, and/or inadequate padding under the apparatus.