Dan’s Papers January 14, 2011 danspapers.com Page 11
BONK! Judge Rules about Man Whose Golf Shot Hit a Guy By Dan Rattiner About a month ago, I reported on two doctors out playing golf last summer and one doctor hitting the other in the head with an errant golf ball without shouting “Fore!” The second doctor, who was blinded in one eye and suffered neurological damage that now limits his ability to practice (his profession, not his golf) sued the other for $1 million for negligence for not shouting that word. The term “Fore!” as part of the etiquette of golf, is supposed to be shouted by a player who has hit a ball off course or too far and is aware that, because of its trajectory, it might smack another golfer or some other person, a calculation about
angles and speed that only the hitting golfer would be in a position to know. The origins of this word “Fore!” came from a time shortly after gunpowder was invented, and when, in a military engagement, a cannon was about to be fired. The person lighting the fuse was supposed to shout “beware before!” upon lighting it. The case involving these two golfers, after a ruling by a lower court, has risen to a New York State Court of Appeals where Appeals judges have made a ruling. I thought it might be of interest to East Enders. The two doctors were Azad Anand, a neurora-
diologist, who was the victim hit in the head, and his golfing partner Anoop Kapoor who swung the club. The incident happened on the first hole, a par four, at the Dix Hills Golf Course here on Long Island. Kapoor hit first and smacked the ball off the tee to the left and into a rough. Anand then hit his ball down the middle and about 20 yards farther along than Kapoor. Another item in the etiquette of golf is that the golfer farthest away from the hole is the one who hits next. So it was Kapoor’s turn. But still another part of the etiquette of golf is that the player who does not hit isn’t supposed to stand (continued on next page)
HE GOT THROWN OUT OF HERE 300 YRS. AGO By Dan Rattiner The Mayor of the Village of West Hampton Dunes has filed a lawsuit against the Southampton Trustees, the local group established in 1686 to take charge of all the wetlands and beaches on behalf of the people in the Town of Southampton, which at that time, included the land that is now the Village of West Hampton Dunes. The courts have again and again ruled against anyone who challenges these rights, which provide for the protection and freedoms of those citizens of the town to use and have access to these beaches even after a piece of the town might be incorporated as a separate village. When the United States was created in 1776, the U. S. Congress voted to accept these ancient laws. Those aspiring to be Trustees continue to run for office every two years as they have since 1686, totally separate from the regular town government, in the communities of Southampton, East Hampton, Southold, Brookhaven and
Huntington. The Mayor of the Village of West Hampton Dunes, Gary Vegliante, might have been expected to file such a lawsuit on behalf of his village. Vegliante, a former owner of bars and restaurants near Patchogue, has been mayor of the Village of West Hampton Dunes, continuously being re-elected every four years, since it was founded in 1993. A fiery advocate of local rights, he once, along with his police department, chased state environmentalists off his village beach when they arrived intending to fence off areas on that beach where endangered birds were nesting and raising their young. He announced he was going to bring foxes in to eat those birds, though he never did. In the present case, he had these comments. “They’re saying they have all these rights because the King of England said so,” Vegliante told the press. “The bottom line is, that guy got thrown out of here 300 years ago. They have no rights, they clearly have no municipal authority.”
Vegliante also claims that the Trustees are misusing taxpayers’ money. This is a pretty big stretch, but you can make a case for it which Vegliante and three of his Village Council members have done. When the U. S. approved the laws of 1686 that created the Town Trustees, they did so with the caveat that the Trustees could protect the citizen’s rights but could not directly tax anybody to raise funds to pay themselves for their services. As a result, the Trustees rely on the Town Boards to give them small amounts of money so they can pay their minimal expenses which the towns willingly do. These amounts are bookkept by the Town, but apparently, in Southampton, some of the checkbooks are in the name of the Board of Trustees and in their offices as a convenience in spending these funds. It is the presence of these small accounts that Vegliante claims is “misuse of funds.” “This is a taxpayer action,” Vegliante says. His suit is not only against the Trustees for misuse of (continued on page 19)