Lawsuit filed after chaotic evacuation, injuries at cheer competition in Dallas

CBS News

4 hours ago

A lawsuit has been filed on behalf of those injured while evacuating the cheer competition held at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas in March, attorneys representing the group announced Monday.
The lawsuit filed by Paul LLP and Aldous Law alleges that the organizer, Varsity Spirit, and facility management failed to provide proper security at the event.
What happened at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Center?
Dallas police said a fight between two people at the convention center led to several poles toppling, creating a loud noise and triggering panic as many people mistakenly thought there was an active shooter inside the building.
With around 58,000 people — including 30,410 athletes and 3,700 coaches — attending the championship, hundreds, if not thousands, evacuated at once on Saturday, March 1.
The disturbance, which occurred around 1 p.m., led to what police described as a "stampede" as people rushed outside.
The Dallas Police Department confirmed that there was no active shooter and no shooting had taken place.
According to Dallas Fire-Rescue, 10 people were taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
"All of the injuries were sustained during the evacuation, and none were life-threatening," said Dallas-Fire Rescue spokesman Jason Evans. "They ranged in severity from bumps and bruises to extremity fractures."
After the incident, Varsity Brands said in a statement:
"All our events have a designated on-site Event Safety Manager, who focuses entirely on ensuring safety and security practices are implemented according to our protocols. This role reports to our Chief Security Officer dedicated to enhancing the security and safety practices at our competitions and camps."
Lawsuit claims negligence, injuries, mental anguish
According to the lawsuit, "hundreds of people" were injured during a chaotic crowd stampede, including parents and children, being trampled and suffering broken bones, concussions, and brain bleeds.
"This wasn't a little something. This was mass chaos," said Ashlea Schwarz of Paul LLP in Kansas City, Mo., who represents the victims. "You had parents separated from their kids for hours. You had a facility that had no plan for reunification in place. People had no idea where they would go to find their children."
The lawsuit states that people in attendance from Kansas, Missouri, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, Texas, and Virginia were injured.
That includes a woman knocked unconscious during the stampede who suffered a series of brain bleeds, according to the lawsuit, and a mother who was "slammed face-first into the concrete and was so severely hurt that her young daughter thought her mom had been fatally shot."
The lawsuit also states that another event participant who hid alone under tractor-trailers outside the convention center suffered from a concussion.
"The event had thousands of people in an area, when the incident happened, the Convention Center and Varsity were unprepared for the havoc, and people got injured seriously, both physically and mentally," said Mark Annick with Androvette Legal Media.
According to the lawsuit, safety protocols were not put in place until after the incident on March 1 and the defendants, Varsity Spirit, Varsity Brands, Omni Hotels Management, OVG Facilities, Oak View Group and Global Spectrum, failed to provide "reasonable care to reduce or eliminate risk" with the lack of security and crowd management.
CBS News Texas has reached out to the defendants for comment and is waiting for a response.
The future of the NCA All-Star National Championship
The NCA All-Star National Championship, formerly held in Dallas for 30 years, will relocate to Houston for 2026, 2027, and 2028. This shift is due to the construction at the Convention Center in Dallas, according to Varsity Brands. The decision was made before a chaotic incident at the 2025 event in Dallas.