The High Court on Tuesday overturned the convictions of three swimming coaches who had been found guilty of negligence causing serious injury for their involvement in a 2018 diving incident that left a student paralyzed.
The verdict, which can be appealed, said that the incident was the result of the student’s “lack of coordination when he jumped into the water” and not negligence on the part of the coaches.
The then-12th-grade student, surnamed Chang (張), sustained a spinal injury that left him paralyzed after diving from a starting block and hitting his head at the bottom of the pool.
Photo: Yang Kuo-wen, Taipei Times
A lower court last year found the three coaches guilty on the grounds that the pool, which was 9cm to 16cm shallower than the competition standard depth of 135cm, should not have been used for diving practice.
EXPERTS’ OPINION
However, a panel of experts told the court that the instructions given by Chang’s main coach were accurate and it was not until the student’s third jump after in-person demonstrations by the coach that the incident occurred.
In the first trial, the court agreed with prosecutors that the defendants failed to consider that the water at the shallow end of the pool was not deep enough to be used in official competitions, but the High Court overturned the decision, saying that there was insufficient evidence to prove that the 188cm-tall student would not have been injured if he had been diving into deeper water.
A district court in August rejected a suit seeking NT$48.14 million (US$1.51 million) in compensation filed by the student’s parents based on the Civil Code, saying that they should file under the State Compensation Act (國家賠償法) instead.
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