Kansas City Art Institute wins trial involving injury claim of former sculpture student

Timothy Skornia was a sculpture student at the Kansas City Art Institute when a Star Crane he was working on collapsed, severely injuring the middle 3 fingers of his left hand. Skornia sued his instructor Larry Buechel and the Kansas City Art Institute for negligence in not having a safety latch on the hook which hoisted the Star Crane and for not providing adequate instructions or warnings to Skornia. Skornia presented evidence of 1.5MM in future lost earning capacity given that he could not be a working artist due to the injury. After 5 days of trial, a Jackson County jury returned a verdict on September 21, 2012 assessing no fault to the defendants. John Schultz was trial counsel for Buechel and the Kansas City Art Institute.