Family of football player who died after head injury sues school system
ROLESVILLE, N.C. -- The family of a North Carolina high school football player who died after sustaining a head injury during practice is suing the Wake County school system and members of the athletic staff.
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The News & Observer reports 17-year-old Isaiah Langston died in September 2014 from a stroke caused by the head injury five days prior. The lawsuit says Rolesville High School did not follow the state's concussion protocol and did nothing as the teen complained of headaches days before his collapse.
State law dictates that student-athletes displaying concussion symptoms must be cleared by a medical doctor or licensed athletic trainer to return to practice.
Attorneys for the school deny that school employees knew Langston had suffered a concussion or that he had complained of headaches before he collapsed.
"Isaiah Langston was negligent in one or more respects and failed to exercise the proper care which prudent persons under the same or similar circumstances would have exercised," the district said in a statement to the News & Observer.
The state medical examiner's report said that Langston died from "complications of vertebral artery dissection" sustained from "blunt force injury" to both his head and neck, CBS affiliate WNCN-TV in Raleigh reports.
