Gwyneth Paltrow is set to take the stand in a civil case regarding a 2016 ski accident, a source confirmed to Fox News Digital.
Paltrow has been sued for $300,000 by a retired optometrist, who claims the actress skied into him from behind at the Deer Valley resort.
Terry Sanderson accused the Goop founder of skiing off after the accident – which left him with a “permanent traumatic brain injury, 4 broken ribs, pain, suffering, loss of enjoyment of life,” along with emotional distress and disfigurement, according to the lawsuit obtained by Fox News Digital.
“Paltrow got up, turned and skied away, leaving Sanderson stunned, lying in the snow, seriously injured,” according to the complaint, which was filed in 2019. “A Deer Valley ski instructor, who had been training Ms. Paltrow, but who did not see the crash, skied over, saw the injured Sanderson and skied off, falsely accusing Sanderson of having caused the crash.”
A judge dismissed Sanderson’s original claim of hit-and-run, and the Deer Valley Resort and instructor were removed from the lawsuit.
Paltrow has maintained that Sanderson actually skied into her, and claims she stuck around until given the OK to leave by the Deer Valley Resort ski instructor. The 50-year-old actress also said Sanderson previously admitted he didn’t have a clear memory of the accident.
She has filed a countersuit, asking for $1 in symbolic damages, and her attorney’s fees to be covered.
Deer Valley Resort’s safety policies instruct skiers to “stop at the scene and render reasonable assistance” if involved in a collision on the slopes. The law requires skiers who have experienced a collision to give their name and permanent address to a resort employee before leaving the scene, according to Deer Valley Resort.
Other suggestions include notifying resort personnel and helping keep other skiers away from the area of incident.
A legal expert explained what a jury would have to decide in order for a judge to rule that Paltrow was negligent in the 2016 accident.
“It’s actually really fuzzy. It just means that a person did not use reasonable care,” attorney Tyler Brown of the firm Nuttall, Brown and Coutts told Fox News Digital. “We all have a duty to use reasonable care to avoid injuring others. And it’s defined really simply as what would a reasonably careful person do in a similar situation.”
Brown, who has handled ski accident lawsuits in the past but is not involved in Paltrow’s current lawsuit, noted that these negligence cases are typically situational.
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