School Playground Injury and a Delayed Emergency Response

Attorney Answer

If this is a public school or a school district, the most important thing on this page is a deadline, and it is six months. Cal. Gov't Code § 911.2(a) requires a claim for injury to a person to be presented to the public entity not later than six months after the cause of action accrues. That written claim comes before any lawsuit, and missing it can end a case that would otherwise have been strong. If the school is private, that requirement does not apply and Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1's two years for an injury claim governs instead. Which one you are in is the first thing to settle.

Do not assume your son's age buys extra time. Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 352(a) provides that where a person entitled to bring an action is under the age of majority when the cause of action accrues, the time of that disability does not count against the limitations period. But government-claim deadlines are not tolled in the same way, and when both rules are in play the interaction has to be worked out on the actual dates by a lawyer, quickly.

On the merits, there are two separate failures in what you describe: how the fall happened, and what was done afterward. Cal. Civ. Code § 1714(a) is the root of both — everyone is responsible for an injury caused to another by a want of ordinary care in the management of their property or person. Whether a school's departure from its own emergency protocol amounts to that, and what legal duty a school owes in supervising children and in summoning care, is not something a general page can decide; it turns on the protocol itself, the incident report, and the timeline. That is why the report you have already read matters so much.

Expect the school to say your son's own conduct during the game played a part. In California that argument limits a claim; it does not defeat one. This state uses pure comparative fault, and the California Supreme Court reaffirmed that system in Daly v. General Motors Corp., 20 Cal. 3d 725 (Cal. 1978): a claimant's recovery is reduced only to the extent that his own lack of reasonable care contributed to the injury. If a claim succeeds, Cal. Civ. Code § 3333 measures damages as the amount that will compensate for all the detriment proximately caused, which is where the ambulance, the hospital care and the treatment ahead of him belong. And because the injured person is a child, Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 372(a)(1) requires a minor to appear through a guardian, a conservator of the estate, or a guardian ad litem appointed by the court — the claim is brought on his behalf, not in his own name.

What you can do

1. Collect and keep every medical record: the ambulance run sheet, the emergency room chart, imaging, and the follow-up care for both the arms and the head injury.

2. Ask the school in writing for the complete incident report, the emergency-response protocol in force that day, and any statements or notes made about the fall. Keep a copy of your request and the date you sent it.

3. Fix the timeline while it is still recoverable — your phone's call log, texts, and the ride-share record will establish those forty minutes far better than memory will.

4. Photograph the slide, the surface beneath it and the surrounding area if they are still as they were.

5. Speak with a local attorney now about whether the school is a public entity and about presenting a written claim, because Cal. Gov't Code § 911.2(a) allows only six months and that period does not wait for anyone.

6. Ask that attorney about the guardian ad litem requirement in Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 372(a)(1), which applies to any claim brought for a child.

Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. For a public school or district, Cal. Gov't Code § 911.2(a) gives six months to present a written claim — the shortest deadline in this area. For a private school, Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1 gives two years for an injury claim. Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 352(a) tolls the running of a limitations period during a minor's disability, but it does not extend a government-claim deadline the same way, so a child's age is not a safety net here. When each clock started depends on your facts, so take the dates to a local attorney immediately rather than working them out from a page.