The Alaska Supreme Court has upheld a lower court decision that dismissed a lawsuit a former student filed against the University of Alaska Fairbanks. The suit alleged negligence and recklessness, saying the university failed to create a safe environment for visually-impaired students after the plaintiff, who’s blind, was injured on campus.
Michael Carey-Thomann sued UAF and the Board of Regents in 2022, claiming the university violated state and federal human rights laws, the Americans with Disabilities Act and Alaska Human Rights Act, that provide protections for people with disabilities.
That was after he climbed over a guardrail he believed to be a bench or a bike rack and fell from a second-story balcony at the Wood Center in 2020, while living on campus during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Wood Center is built into a hill, and the balcony can be accessed from outside without ascending stairs.
A Fairbanks Superior Court judge granted summary judgment to the university in 2024 and dismissed the case, which the plaintiff appealed. State supreme court justices affirmed the lower court ruling in an opinion issued May 1.
Sandra Rolfe, Carey-Thomann’s attorney, declined an interview request for this story. But she told justices in oral argument last June that her client wasn’t familiar with that part of campus and wasn’t told about the balcony when he got a tour. She said he frequently encountered and hopped over benches and bike racks while walking around his normal route.
“He was never informed that there were balconies like this on the UAF campus. At this point, he had been on campus for approximately seven months and had never encountered it or given any knowledge that any kind of balcony existed whatsoever,” she said.
Kristin Crabb, an attorney for the university, said during oral argument that the guardrail was in good condition and that it’s there to protect people from going past it. She argued Carey-Thomann didn’t adequately investigate what was in front of him and said UAF wasn’t responsible for protecting him from risks created by his own conduct.
“Is it foreseeable that that reaction to an unknown metal object, he's going to climb up and hop over? I don't think so,” she said. “I mean, I think you would assume, not knowing what is in front of you, you're going to try to find out before jumping.”
The state supreme court ruling says the state and federal laws do protect visually impaired people from discrimination, but don’t mandate measures to prevent physical injury that would apply to this case.
The ruling also says the case is controlled by precedent the university’s attorney cited, a 1997 decision in Schumacher v. City and Borough of Yakutat, which found there’s no duty to protect someone when risks are created by their own actions instead of inherently dangerous property conditions.
Marmian Grimes, a spokesperson for UAF, said in an emailed statement that the university is grateful for the state supreme court’s “thoughtful consideration and reasoned affirmation of the lower court’s decision.”