One bounce. One bad landing. One broken neck. That is all it takes for a Saturday afternoon at an Allen trampoline park to turn into a lifetime of medical monitoring and financial strain. You were likely at a birthday party, perhaps at the Urban Air in McKinney or the Jumping World right here in Allen on McDermott Drive. You were watching from the rail, or maybe you were in the party room, and in two seconds, your child was airborne. Then they weren’t.
The scream that followed is something you never forget. As Kaitlin “Kati” Hill told ABC News after her three-year-old son Colton broke his femur in a park body cast, it was “the worst scream that you could ever have heard from a child.” We hear those stories every day at Attorney911. We represent families in Allen and across Texas who are told by park managers and insurance adjusters that a signed waiver means they have no rights. We are here to tell you that is a lie.
We are The Manginello Law Firm. Led by Ralph Manginello, with over 25 years of experience in federal and state courts, we have spent decades making corporate giants pay for the decisions they made to prioritize profit over safety. Our team includes associate attorney Lupe Peña, who previously sat on the other side of the table defending the very insurance companies and recreational facilities we now sue. He knows exactly how their waivers are written and exactly where the holes are hidden.
If your child was hurt at a trampoline park serving Allen, what happens in the next seven days will likely determine the rest of the case. Park surveillance DVRs in North Texas often overwrite in as little as 7 to 30 days. Incident reports get “finalized” (revised) by risk management teams. Attendants quit or transfer. We move faster than they do. Our spoliation letters go out within 24 hours of your call.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911. We are available 24/7, we work on a contingency fee basis where you pay nothing unless we win, and we handle the medicine as well as the law. Hablamos Español. Lupe Peña habla con usted directamente.
The Reality of Trampoline Injuries in Allen and Collin County
Allen is a community driven by youth sports and family recreation. Between Allen ISD’s massive athletic programs and the dozens of club volleyball, cheer, and gymnastics facilities lining the U.S. 75 corridor, our children are some of the most active in Texas. But that activity comes with a documented risk that the trampoline industry refuses to candidly disclose.
The current peer-reviewed benchmark for these injuries is the January 2024 study by Teague et al. in the journal Pediatrics. The data is sobering: across 8.4 million jumper-hours, researchers documented 13,256 trampoline-park injuries. Foam pits—the attractions that look the safest—actually carry an injury rate of 1.91 per 1,000 jumper-hours. If your child is in a high-performance or “advanced skills” zone, that rate jumps to 2.11 per 1,000.
In a metro area the size of DFW, this isn’t a rare occurrence. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram documented approximately 500 injuries across 21 trampoline parks in the DFW metro over a seven-year period. These aren’t just “scraped knees.” According to the American Journal of Roentgenology (AJR/R3J 2024), up to 1.6% of all pediatric emergency department trauma visits are now trampoline-related.
When these injuries happen, your child is likely routed to Children’s Medical Center Plano or the Level 1 trauma bay at Children’s Medical Center Dallas. The surgeons there understand what a “trampoline fracture” (a proximal tibial metaphysis buckle fracture) looks like. They understand that a child’s bone is biomechanically distinct—incompletely ossified and more pliable, with an open physis (growth plate) that fails at lower loads than adult bone. Most importantly, they understand that a Salter-Harris Type II fracture at age nine isn’t a “healed” injury until that child reaches skeletal maturity at age 18. If that growth plate was destroyed at a Sky Zone or Urban Air, your child’s leg may not grow straight, or at all.
What Happened: The Physics of Corporate Negligence
The trampoline park industry did not need a government regulator to tell them how to keep kids safe. They wrote their own rules. ASTM F2970 is the voluntary consensus standard drafted by the industry to establish a safety floor—rules for attendant-to-jumper ratios, age-separated jumping, and foam pit maintenance. When a park in Allen ignores these rules, it isn’t an “accident.” It is a business decision to operate below the safety floor to save on labor costs.
The Double-Bounce: A Physics Weapon
Imagine a Saturday afternoon at the Sky Zone in Frisco or Jumping World Allen. The court is packed. The monitor—likely a 17-year-old making $12 an hour with three hours of training—is looking at his phone. A 200-pound adult lands on a trampoline bed just as your 60-pound child is pushing off it.
Physics doesn’t negotiate. The kinetic energy transfer from the heavier mass to the lighter one multiplies your child’s launch force by up to 4x. Your child isn’t jumping anymore; they have been catapulted into a trajectory their developing musculoskeletal system cannot decelerate. This results in the comminuted femoral shaft fractures and trimalleolar ankle dislocations we see in our case files. ASTM F2970 requires parks to operationalize weight and age separation specifically to prevent this. When they don’t, they are choosing to accept that energy-transfer mechanism.
The Foam Pit Illusion
Foam pits are the source of the most catastrophic outcomes, including quadriplegia and death. The 2012 death of Ty Thomasson at a park in Phoenix—where the foam pit was only 2 feet, 8 inches deep instead of the recommended 6 feet—led to “Ty’s Law.” The industry responded by creating EN ISO 23659:2022, a mandatory standard in Europe that requires specific pit depths and maintenance.
In Texas, we are still in a voluntary regime. Many Allen-area parks still use foam blocks that absorb sweat, saliva, and bacteria, and compact over time. When a child dives head-first and their head wedges between cubes, the decelerating friction on the skull while the body’s momentum continues creates the cervical hyperflexion that causes SCIWORA (Spinal Cord Injury Without Radiographic Abnormality). The industry knows this—which is why Sky Zone, Inc. and Unleashed Brands (parent of Urban Air) have been replacing pits with airbags. But if they haven’t made the switch yet at the park your child visited, they made a cost decision that put your child’s spine at risk.
Who is Responsible: Piercing the 5-Layer Stack
Most personal injury firms in North Texas will sue the local LLC that runs the park and stop there. That is a mistake. The operator LLC is usually undercapitalized and carries a primary policy that won’t cover a catastrophic life-care plan. We look at the entire 5-layer defendant stack:
- The Operator LLC: The entity on the lease in Allen or McKinney.
- The Franchisee: The multi-unit holding company that may own five or ten parks.
- The Franchisor: Entities like Sky Zone Franchising LLC or Urban Air Franchise Holdings, who mandate the training and safety manuals.
- The Corporate Parent: Sky Zone, Inc. (formerly CircusTrix LLC; backed by Palladium Equity Partners) or Unleashed Brands (backed by Seidler Equity Partners).
- The Private Equity Sponsor: The investment committees that approved the cost-cutting measures that reduced attendant ratios.
We use the Damion Collins v. Urban Air Overland Park precedent, where a $15.6 million arbitration award was issued in 2023. In that case, the franchisor (UATP Management LLC) was held responsible for 40% of the award because of a “systemic failure” to implement safety changes. We don’t care how many corporate layers they hide behind. We’ve gone toe-to-toe with Fortune 500 corporations like BP, Walmart, and Amazon. We know how to pierce the shield.
The Texas Waiver: It Is Not a Wall
You likely signed a waiver on an iPad at the front desk while your kids were tugging on your arm to get in. The park adjuster will tell you that piece of paper ends your case. In Texas, that is rarely true.
Under the Dresser Industries v. Page Petroleum (1993) “fair notice” doctrine, a Texas waiver must be conspicuous and use the explicit word “negligence.” If it was buried in a screen of fine print, it fails. More importantly, under Munoz v. II Jaz Inc., a parent in Texas CANNOT waive a minor child’s personal cause of action. While the May 2025 Texas Supreme Court ruling in Cerna v. Pearland Urban Air gave parks more power to force cases into arbitration, it did NOT make them immune to negligence.
Our firm understands the Delfingen US-Texas v. Valenzuela doctrine, which allows us to challenge waivers signed by families whose primary language is Spanish when no translation was offered. We also rely on the Cosmic Jump $11.485 million verdict in Harris County as proof that when a jury sees gross negligence—subjective awareness of a danger like a torn mat—no waiver in the world will save the defendant.
The Under-Recognized Medical Emergency: Rhabdomyolysis
If your child visited a park in Allen during a scorching Texas summer and spent two hours jumping, you need to watch for more than just broken bones. We currently litigate a $10 million lawsuit against the University of Houston involving rhabdomyolysis and acute kidney failure.
Rhabdomyolysis is the breakdown of muscle tissue that releases myoglobin into the bloodstream, essentially poisoning the kidneys. High-intensity jumping for 90-120 minutes in a heated indoor environment with poor hydration (and only sugary sodas at the concession stand) is a prime environment for exertional rhabdo.
If, 12 to 48 hours after the park visit, your child has:
- Cola-colored or dark-brown urine.
- Muscle pain wildly out of proportion to the activity.
- Extreme listlessness or confusion.
Go to the ER immediately. Ask for a creatine kinase (CK) blood test and a urinalysis for myoglobin. The park likely never mentioned this risk, but we understand the physiology and the litigation architecture needed to hold them accountable for it.
How We Build Your Child’s Case
We don’t “handle” trampoline cases; we architect them. Our process involves:
- Immediate Spoliation Demand: Certified mail sent within 24 hours to preserve the DVR hardware and metadata.
- Digital Forensics: We use tools like Magnet AXIOM to pull “revised” incident reports and kiosk audit trails. If the video “glitched” on four cameras (as it did in the $3.5M Mathew Knight case), we prove it was intentional.
- Expert Retention: We retain biomechanical engineers to reconstruct the energy transfer of the double-bounce and pediatric orthopedic surgeons to testify on the Salter-Harris growth plate damage.
- Life-Care Planning: For catastrophic injuries, we don’t look at the current hospital bill. We look at the next 60 years. We calculate the cost of attendant care, corrective osteotomies, home modifications, and lost earning capacity.
- Chain-Wide Discovery: We subpoena the 5-year “loss runs” from the franchisor’s insurance carrier to prove that they knew this mechanism was injuring children across the country and did nothing.
As client Chad Harris said, “You are NOT just some client… You are FAMILY to them.” We represent parents who are exhausted, scared, and being bullied by a billion-dollar industry. We take that burden off your shoulders so you can focus on the surgery and the rehab.
Frequently Asked Questions for Allen Parents
Can I sue if I signed the Urban Air or Sky Zone waiver?
Yes. In Texas, a parent generally cannot sign away a child’s right to recover for their own injuries. Furthermore, if the park was grossly negligent—meaning they knew about a danger and ignored it—the waiver is void under the Moriel doctrine.
How much is a trampoline injury settlement worth?
Recovery depends on the injury. Permanent spinal cord injuries routinely settle or reach verdicts in the $5M to $15M range. Severe pediatric fractures with growth-plate damage often fall between $500K and $2.5M. We track the trajectory of national “nuclear verdicts” to ensure you aren’t settling for the $1M primary floor when there are umbrella layers above it.
How do I tell if they were negligent vs. just an accident?
If there weren’t enough monitors, if a bigger kid was allowed on your child’s bed, if the padding was torn, or if the foam pit was too shallow, that is negligence. ASTM F2970 is the checklist we use to prove it.
They wouldn’t call 911—is that legal?
It is a common industry tactic to downplay injuries to avoid generating a paper trail for the insurance carrier. At the Urban Air in Southlake, a parent review documented that staff were specifically instructed NOT to call 911. This is evidence of a reckless corporate culture.
How long do I have to do something—is there a deadline?
In Texas, the statute of limitations is 2 years for adults. For minors, the clock is “tolled” (paused) until they turn 18, meaning they have until age 20. However, the evidence clock is 30 days or less. If you wait, the surveillance video is gone, and the witnesses have quit. Call us this week.
Does it matter which brand—is one safer than the others?
Sky Zone, Urban Air, Altitude, and DEFY all operate under similar private-equity pressure to maximize capacity and minimize staff. We look at the specific location’s inspection history and the chain’s national pattern of Sky Rider strangulations or harness failures.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911 | Attorney911
Your child’s life changed in one jump. The trampoline park’s risk-management team is already working to protect the corporate parent. They have lawyers; so do you.
Ralph Manginello and Lupe Peña are ready to fight for your family. We advance every expense, we take the tough cases other firms turn down, and we don’t stop until we reach the deepest pocket in the insurance tower.
1-888-ATTY-911.
Hablamos Español.
No fee unless we win.
What happened to your child at an Allen park wasn’t an accident—it was the output of a system. Let us show you how to take that system apart.
