N.Y. legislator files federal lawsuit over snowmobile crash

A New York state legislator has sued the parent company of Whitefish Mountain Resort and Columbia Falls-based company J & L Snowmobile Rentals for medical costs that followed a February 2014 crash.

Aravella Simotas, a Democratic assembly member in New York’s lower statehouse, and her husband, John Katsanos, filed the lawsuit Sept. 28 in U.S. District Court in Missoula.

Simotas is asking the court to award more than $800,000 in damages for medical bills that she incurred after the crash and to set aside additional money for future care.

In the lawsuit, Simotas claims that before she and her husband departed for a snowmobile tour she asked about the safety of the trail she and her husband were riding on and asked  why the helmet she was wearing was tight and did not have a chin guard on the front like her husband’s.

She later learned the protective gear was a junior-sized helmet.

The tour left during heavy fog, the lawsuit claims. Simotas lost sight of the guiding snowmobile and hit a tree. Her helmet came off in the collision. Her husband claims he had to pour blood out of her throat and help responding emergency workers use an aspirator to keep Simotas alive.

She was airlifted to Kalispell Regional Medical Center.

The lawsuit claims the resort and snowmobile company “knew or should have known that the guided snowmobile tour in which plaintiffs participated posed serious hazards not only due to steep terrain, sharp curves and shared trails with skiers and snowboarders, but also because the tour would be hazardous that day, given the adverse weather condition of heavy fog which obscured the snowmobile trail and other potential hazards.”

Whitefish Mountain Resort declined to comment on the lawsuit. J & L Snowmobiles could not be reached for comment. Simotas’ attorneys would not comment further on the lawsuit.

Reporter Megan Strickland may be reached at 758-4459 or by email at mstrickland@dailyinterlake.com.