Court clears Warner Bros. Movie World of wrongdoing over ‘scalping’ injury on Looney Tunes Carousel

Gold Coast theme park Warner Bros. Movie World has been cleared of any wrongdoing in relations to an incident on a carousel ride that left a 12-year-old boy with severe head injuries.

After two days of evidence at a judge-only trial in the Southport Magistrates Court, Work Health Safety Queensland (WHSQ) withdrew its prosecution of Movie World operator, Village Roadshow Theme Parks.

WHSQ had accused Village Roadshow of failing in its duty of care after the 12-year-old suffered an "ear-to-ear de-scalping injury" and several fractures on the attraction’s Looney Tunes Carousel ride in April 2022.

Magistrate Lisa O'Neill was told the boy was standing on the back of the carousel's Wile E. Coyote character, instead of sitting on it, when his head went through an open aperture in the ceiling.

The Court heard the boy's injuries were caused when his head was pinned between the edge of the aperture and machinery that drives the character up and down on a pole as the carousel turns.

As reported by the ABC, Barrister for WHSQ, Clare O'Connor, told the Court an independent safety report, provided to the theme park eight months before the accident, had identified the ceiling aperture as presenting a risk of crush injury and recommended rigid plastic brushes be installed on the opening.

O'Connor advised “such brushes are considered best practice and are in use at carousels at Sea World and Dreamworld.”

She said the report found the ride complied with safety requirements, was in "excellent operational condition" and a recommendation to install plastic brushes was being considered by the theme park before the incident.

O'Connor told the Court that by not installing the brushes, Village Roadshow had exposed carousel riders to a risk of injury or death.

Village Roadshow's barrister, Saul Holt, told the Court the boy's actions on the carousel and his resulting injuries were "not reasonably foreseeable".

She noted “this 12-year-old boy was described by one witness as surfing the character when his head, either deliberately or inadvertently, entered the hole in the ceiling of the ride.

"The steps the prosecution say were absent … would not have prevented this from happening."

Holt said the carousel was immediately shut down after the incident and underwent a "hardcore engineering solution" before it was re-opened several months later.

He noted “once the risk was reasonably foreseeable, Village Roadshow Theme Parks made it impossible for it to occur," he said.

Movie World attraction attendant Ruby Piakura, who was operating the carousel on the day of the incident, told the Court she had worked on the ride for more than six months at the time.

Piakura said she had never seen a rider stand on a character before that day and had hit the emergency stop as soon as she realised something was wrong.

Asked if she had seen a rider stand on a character since, she told the Court that, while she continued to work at Movie World, she no longer operated the carousel.

She advised "I haven't wanted to go back to working on that ride.”

Theme park ride safety consultant David Randall wrote the report that recommended plastic brushes be installed on the carousel.

He told the Court he had made the recommendation as an opportunity for improvement on the ride, not as a requirement for it to operate.

He said plastic brushes were a tactile deterrent rather than a physical barrier, meaning even if they were installed on the ride, the boy's head could still have gone through them and into the machinery above.

Randall said that, even with decades of experience in safety management, he did not identify a person standing on a carousel character as a foreseeable risk, explaining "I was extremely surprised after the event, which is unusual for me, as I'd never considered that as an issue.”

On the third day of the trial, O'Connor told Magistrate O'Neill that the prosecution had no further evidence to offer, and asked to withdraw from the case.

Magistrate O'Neill stated "I think that is a responsible decision, given the evidence we have heard” before she dismissed the charge against VRTP.

VRTP will make an application for legal costs after the charge was dismissed.

Image: Warner Bros. Movie World's Looney Tunes Carousel ride - used for illustrative purposes only. Credit: Village Roadshow Theme Parks.