The 80s pop star and actor Rick Springfield took the witness stand in a retrial of a lawsuit that claims he caused serious injuries to a woman with his buttocks at a concert in 2004.
Vicki Calcagno, from Liverpool, New York, claims Springfield – who is best known for his hit song Jessie’s Girl, but who revealed in December that he would be joining the cast for season two of the HBO series True Detective – struck her with his rear end while performing, causing her to fall and resulting in “serious, disabling and permanent” injury.
The original 2007 complaint also claims Springfield was “careless and negligent” during his performance, jumping on chairs and benches at Chevy Court in Syracuse, according to the Syracuse Post-Standard, which reported that Springfield became very emotional, yelling and crying on the witness stand in New York while being cross-examined by Calcagno’s lawyer on Tuesday.
Calcagno’s lawyer, Kenneth Goldblatt, said in a statement in 2013 that the seats in the arena were wet from rain and the plastic railing from which Springfield fell was flimsy. “Mr Springfield knowingly ventured into the audience under conditions he knew posed a potential threat of harm,” Goldblatt said.
A New York state supreme court judge declared a mistrial in 2013 after widespread media reports – and the trending hashtag “#RickSpringfieldsAss” – led to a new witness, Penny Nolin, coming forward to claim that she, too, had been hit in the head by Springfield’s posterior.
On Monday, Nolin reportedly told the court that Springfield had stood with one foot on the back of a metal bench, and another on a white fence, and that he fell backwards on to her and his buttocks hit her forehead.
The case caused controversy in Syracuse. In an open letter to the community in November 2013, Goldblatt attempted to answer negative comments posted about his client.
“Some castigated Ms Calcagno for having the temerity to sue Mr Springfield in what was labeled an ‘obvious attempt by a welfare woman seeking money’,” he wrote. “To begin with, Vicki Calcagno is not on welfare. Rather, she is an educated woman, the mother of a 13-year-old girl, and, prior to 2004, was consistently employed in the finance industry.”
He said that while many view Springfield as a rock star, Goldblatt said that underneath that person he was “just a regular person, a very nice gentleman who, like all of us, is capable of a lapse in judgment”.
In a 2004 review of the concert unearthed by the Post-Standard, Springfield’s performance is described as having been well-received despite delays caused by thunderstorms. “Throughout the concert, Springfield let his fans grab his buttocks while he traversed the seating area,” the review noted.
“I was not expecting him to be so down to earth and in the audience,” one fan told the reviewer.
