ORLANDO - The United States Tennis Association is appealing a $9 million verdict awarded to a woman who was allegedly sexually assaulted by her coach.
Orlando federal judge Paul Byron on Aug. 16 rejected the USTA's motion for judgment, new trial or remittitur, leaving in place the nine-figure verdict reached May 6 in Kylie McKenzie's lawsuit. She alleged escalating physical contact from her USTA coach culminated in sexual assault on a court he had specifically picked to be out of view from others.
On Sept. 12, the USTA filed its notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Its lawyers are Kevin Schaughnessy, Megan Martin and William Weber of Baker & Hostetler in Orlando.
The coach, Anibal Aranda, was not named as a defendant. The lawsuit instead alleges USTA fails to protect players.
Charged with negligent supervision and retention, battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence and punitive damages, the USTA fought the case all the way to trial, where it lost. It made several post-trial arguments for why the verdict needs altered and now that it has lost them can appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
The USTA argued it had no special relationship with McKenzie that could lead to a negligence claim.
"This special relationship arises when these programs voluntarily take custody of players under circumstances that deprive the players of normal opportunities for protection or that subject them to association with persons likely to harm them," Byron wrote.
"Florida law recognizes this sort of special relationship exists between a school and its students."
That is what happened here, Byron ruled. McKenzie was ranked the 33rd junior in the world when she injured her shoulder in California, requiring a long rehabilitation. She had been recruited by a USTA national coach to train there.
In 2018, after rehab and when she was 19 years old, she was assigned to train with Aranda, a 34-year-old national coach. Aranda would typically reserve one of the three courts not visible from an administrative building at the training facility.
Aranda commented on McKenzie's looks at the beginning, then started "grooming" her by sitting close to her and massaging her shoulder. He would rest his hand on her upper thigh and move it up and down, Byron's decision says.
When adjusting her serve, he'd occasionally slide his hand from her lower back to her buttocks, which he also would pull into his groin while teaching tennis form.
Finally, while seated on a bench, he put his hand under a towel that was covering McKenzie's legs and "caressed her vagina without her consent," the ruling says. She reported this to police and the USTA manager of Player Development Events and Programming.
It turns out, that woman, Jessica Battaglia, had been assaulted in the same manner by Aranda years earlier, the decision says. She reported her assault after hearing about McKenzie's.
Compensatory damages for negligence made up one-third of the $9 million verdict.
"Ms. Battaglia was under a duty imposed by the Safe Sport Code to report sexual misconduct," Byron wrote.
Further sexual abuse was foreseeable, McKenzie successfully argued. In response to a demand from a Congressional committee, the USTA disclosed 27 reported sexual assaults between 2013 and 2018.
The jury tacked on $6 million in punitive damages against the USTA, an amount justified by the facts, Byron wrote.
"The Plaintiff argues, and the Court agrees, that the evidence showed the USTA had a 'culture' of conscious indifference to the safety of the young women who trained at their campus," Byron wrote.
"This culture of gross indifference and even open hostility to protecting vulnerable players explains why the USTA failed to institute basic safety procedures at its National Campus."
Those could have been television monitors and mandatory supervision of coaches.