4 days ago
Richmond settles with Ty Zantuck over ‘horribly wrong' back treatment claim
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Zantuck, who played 68 games for the Tigers between 2000 and 2004, sued the club and two of its doctors, alleging they breached their duty of care.
On Wednesday, his South Australian lawyer, Greg Griffin, said the years' long legal battle had been a 'difficult process' but a confidential settlement had been reached.
'All parties are happy to see it finished,' he said.
Richmond declined to comment when approached by the Herald Sun.
In 2022, a Supreme Court judge granted an extension on the statute of limitation on Zantuck's claim.
Justice Mary-Jane Ierodiaconou found the alleged conduct of the football club was 'egregious' and had effectively left Zantuck's 'life crippled'.
In court documents, Zantuck claimed his back injury stemmed from a training camp in the Grampians in 2001 where he was required to carry a 30kg backpack despite earlier being diagnosed with stress fractures to his lower back.
The former defender claimed to have received between 15 to 20 epidurals, as well as dozens of local anaesthetic injections, in a bid to keep him playing.
The court previously heard Zantuck had met with a law firm almost a decade earlier about his back injuries.
They told him there was 'nothing the solicitors could do to assist him because no one had ever successfully sued the AFL and its clubs'.
'I'm still traumatised by the whole thing,' Zantuck told an earlier hearing.
He alleged the doctors at the football club got his treatment 'horribly wrong' and the injections had 'ruined the muscles in my body'.
'I still love the Richmond Football Club, my two sons barrack for them,' Zantuck said.
'I just think they got the treatment horribly wrong.'
Zantuck lodged a separate concussion claim, alleging he was allowed to continue to train and play AFL despite suffering repeated on-field head knocks which had not properly healed.
The Herald Sun understands that case is still before the courts.
