CNN
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Gwyneth Paltrow could take the stand for the first time Friday in a Park City, Utah, courtroom during her 2016 skiing accident trial, but first, her accuser will have her say.
The actress and entrepreneur have been in the courtroom since the trial began on Tuesday, when attorneys for Paltrow and Terri Sanderson, a 76-year-old retired optometrist, made opening statements to the jury.
Sanderson will testify Friday, his attorneys said.
At the end of Thursday’s hearing, Sanderson’s attorneys indicated that Paltrow would take the stand Friday “if time permits.”
Sanderson alleges that Paltrow suffered permanent injuries and brain damage when Paltrow crashed into her while the two were skiing on an opening run in a Utah mountain in February 2016. Sanderson says Paltrow and her ski instructor fled without getting her after the incident. Medical care.
Paltrow filed a countersuit against Sanderson in 2019, claiming she slipped into him.
Both have been engaged in a legal battle for seven years.
In the days since the trial began, a series of witnesses have testified, including Sanderson’s friend Craig Ramone, who was on the slopes the day of the crash. Raman appeared as the first witness in the hearing on Tuesday.
Radiologist Wendell Kippy testified Wednesday that Sanderson “deteriorated” after the collision and stopped performing many of the activities he had done before the incident. The jury also heard expert testimony from neuropsychologist Sam Goldstein, who evaluated Sanderson in 2020 and testified about various changes in Sanderson’s mental health since the conflict.
On Thursday, Sanderson’s daughter, Polly Sanderson-Grasham, gave emotional testimony that a year and a half after the accident, she noticed how her father’s “processing speed” had changed. Sanderson-Grasham later said that her father was a “politician” and that she believed he wanted “someone to apologize or admit or take responsibility for the decision they made that day.”
Video depositions from Alina K. Fong, a clinical neuropsychologist who treated Sanderson following the collision, and Richard Boehme, a biomedical engineer who testified as an expert witness, were also played for the jury Thursday. Boehme evaluated Sanderson in 2021 and testified that he believed the injuries to Sanderson’s ribs could only have been the result of being struck from behind.
In court documents originally filed by Sanderson and obtained by CNN in 2019, Sanderson said that while skiing at Deer Valley Resort, Paltrow “allegedly went over the curb … hitting him hard, knocking him over, causing a brain injury and four broken ribs.” Bones and other serious injuries.”
According to Paltrow’s countersuit, she was “skiing with her family on vacation in Utah when the plaintiff — who was uphill from Ms. Paltrow — plowed into her back. She suffered a full ‘body blow.’ She stopped skiing for the day even though it was still morning.
Sanderson initially sued Paltrow for $3.1 million, but later amended her complaint and is now seeking more than $300,000 in damages, according to court documents.
Paltrow is seeking $1 in damages and attorneys’ fees.
