One bounce. One bad landing. One broken neck. That is all it takes at a trampoline park.
Families in Kurten often head into Bryan or College Station for a day of fun at Jumping World or Urban Air, believing that a business specifically marketed to children would be engineered for safety. They sign the iPad at the kiosk because the line is long and the kids are excited. They believe the waiver is just a routine formality. Then, the double-bounce happens in two seconds. Your child is airborne, then not. By the time you hear the scream—the one Kaitlin Hill described to ABC News as “the worst scream you could ever have heard from a child”—your family’s life has changed forever.
We are The Manginello Law Firm, known as Attorney911. With over 25 years of experience fighting for injury victims since 1998, Ralph Manginello has spent his career making corporate defendants pay for the shortcuts they take with human lives. Our team includes associate attorney Lupe Peña, a former insurance defense lawyer who used to sit on the other side of the table. He knows exactly how trampoline parks and their insurers try to hide behind waivers because he used to write the arguments they use. Now, he uses that internal playbook against them to help families in Kurten and throughout Brazos County recover every dime they deserve.
If your child was injured at a trampoline park or on a neighbor’s backyard trampoline in Kurten, the clock is already running. Most people don’t realize that park surveillance video is often overwritten in as little as 7 to 30 days. Incident reports are “finalized” (and often sanitized) before you even leave the hospital. We don’t wait. Our spoliation letter goes out within 24 hours of your retention—sent by certified mail to the park, the franchisor, and the insurance carrier. We advance every expense—the biomechanical engineer, the pediatric orthopedic consultant, and the ASTM compliance specialist. You pay us nothing unless we win.
The Reality of Trampoline Injuries in Kurten and Brazos County
Nationally, more than 300,000 trampoline-related emergency room visits happen every year. In a growing region like the Brazos Valley, we see these injuries spike during the hot Texas summers when families in Kurten seek the air-conditioned refuge of indoor parks like Urban Air in Bryan. These facilities operate as industrial-scale throughput centers. On a Saturday afternoon, as hundreds of kids pack the courts, the safety standards the industry wrote for itself often become the first casualty of the pursuit of margin.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has advised against recreational trampoline use since 1999. That is over a quarter-century of medical consensus that these products are inherently dangerous for developing bodies. When a park in the Kurten area violates the industry’s own safety standard—ASTM F2970—they aren’t just being sloppy; they are choosing to operate below a safety floor their own peers established.
Whether it is a double-bounce at an Urban Air near Highway 6 or a failed net on a Jumpking trampoline in a Kurten backyard, these injuries are predictable business outputs, not accidents. We treat them as such. Our firm has recovered multi-million dollar settlements for traumatic brain injuries (TBI) and spinal cord injuries—the same catastrophic categories that a single bad landing can cause. As client Chad Harris said, “You are NOT a pest to them and you are NOT just some client… You are FAMILY to them.” We fight for your family because we know that a “broken leg” at age seven is actually a Salter-Harris growth plate fracture that could require a decade of orthopedic monitoring.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911 today. Ralph Manginello and our team bring federal court experience and a track record of taking on Fortune 500 giants like BP to your case. We aren’t intimidated by the private equity firms behind Sky Zone and Urban Air. We’ve already beaten their biggest lawyers.
Why “Wait and See” is the Most Dangerous Decision a Kurten Parent Can Make
You might be thinking you should wait until your child is out of the cast before calling a lawyer. In Kurten, that wait can be fatal to your case. While the Texas statute of limitations usually gives you two years to file a lawsuit, the evidence life-cycle is measured in days.
The trampoline park in Bryan or College Station likely uses a digital video recorder (DVR) system that purges old footage on a rolling cycle. By day 10, the Saturday afternoon your child was hurt is gone. The “court monitor”—often a 17-year-old with four hours of training—might quit or transfer to another location within a month. The foam pit cubes that bottomed out when your son landed will be refilled or “fluffed” by next week.
When we are retained, we immediately demand the preservation of:
- The original, unedited surveillance footage from all angles.
- The original incident report and all metadata showing who edited it and when.
- The daily inspection logs for the 30 days preceding the injury.
- Staff time-clock records to prove the monitor-to-jumper ratio was below ASTM F2970 specs.
- The exact version of the waiver you signed, including the IP address and device ID used at the kiosk.
Most firms handle a trampoline case like a garden-variety slip-and-fall. We don’t. We use a former insurance defense insider to spot where the park is hiding evidence. Lupe Peña knows the “Standard Operating Procedures” of these chains because he used to defend them. He knows that if we don’t demand the internal risk-management emails within the first week, they might “disappear” under a routine deletion policy.
The Trap of the “Friendly Adjuster” Call
Within 48 hours of an injury at a park near Kurten, you will likely get a call from an insurance adjuster. They will sound concerned. They might offer to pay for your initial ER co-pay or send a “Medical Payments” (Med-Pay) check for $3,000.
Never take this call. Adjusters are trained to lead you into the “Recorded Statement Trap.” Every “I think” or “I’m not sure” you say will be used in a deposition two years from now to argue that your child caused their own injury. They might casually mention the waiver you signed as if it ends the case. It doesn’t.
We currently litigate a $10 million lawsuit against a major university involving rhabdomyolysis and acute kidney failure. We know how institutions and their insurers use delay and friendliness to lower the settlement value of a life-altering injury. If you were injured in Kurten, tell the adjuster: “I am represented by Attorney911. Call Ralph Manginello.” Then hang up.
Understanding the Physics: Why Trampolines Maim Children
A trampoline is an energy-storage device. When a 200-pound adult lands on a mat at the same time a 60-pound child from Kurten is pushing off, the physics are devastating. This is the double-bounce multiplier. The stored energy from the adult’s landing transfers through the bed and can multiply the child’s launch force by up to 4x. The child isn’t jumping anymore; they are being catapulted at velocities their bones cannot deceleration.
ASTM F2970 requires parks to enforce age and weight separation specifically to prevent this. When a monitor at a park near Kurten allows an adult and a small child on the same bed, they are knowingly violating a standard written to prevent bone-shattering launches.
The Damage to Developing Bones
Children’s bones are not just smaller versions of adult bones. They contain growth plates (physes) made of pliable cartilage. These plates are weaker than the surrounding ligaments. In a standard double-bounce, the force travels through the ankle and snaps the growth plate in the tibia or femur. This is a Salter-Harris fracture. If not managed by a pediatric orthopedic specialist, it can lead to permanent limb-length discrepancy—meaning one leg grows shorter than the other.
We represent the parent at the trauma-bay bedside watching a surgeon explain why their child may never play sports again. That is why we advance the cost of high-level pediatric experts. We don’t just ask for the hospital bill; we build a Pediatric Life-Care Plan that accounts for the next 70 years of your child’s needs.
Commercial Trampoline Parks vs. Backyard Risks in Brazos County
Whether your child was hurt at a massive facility or in a Kurten backyard, the legal path to recovery is different, but the accountability is the same.
Commercial Parks: The 5-Layer Defendant Stack
When we sue a chain like Sky Zone or Urban Air, we don’t just name the local park. We pierce the corporate shield by naming:
- The Operator LLC: The immediate business on the lease.
- The Franchisee: The group that likely owns several locations.
- The Franchisor: The entity (like Sky Zone Franchising LLC) that sets the (often ignored) safety rules.
- The Parent Corporation: Sky Zone, Inc. (formerly CircusTrix LLC) or Unleashed Brands.
- The Private Equity Sponsor: The money behind the margin-cutting decisions, such as Palladium Equity Partners or Seidler Equity Partners.
We go upstream because the local LLC is often undercapitalized by design. The money is in the excess and umbrella insurance layers held by the corporate parents.
Backyard Trampolines: The Attractive Nuisance
In Kurten, the backyard trampoline is a staple of neighborhood play. However, Texas law recognizes the Attractive Nuisance Doctrine. If you have a trampoline on your Kurten property that attracts a neighborhood child, you can be held liable for their injuries even if they were technically trespassing.
If your child was hurt on a neighbor’s trampoline, we look for:
- Manufacturer Defects: Did a Jumpking or Skywalker frame weld fail? (We check for CPSC recalls immediately).
- Weather Degradation: In the Kurten climate, the hot Texas sun and humidity degrade polypropylene netting and pit metal springs with rust. A net that looks fine can fail under a 50-pound impact if it has been in the sun for three seasons.
- Retailer Liability: If the trampoline was a “Bouncepro” brand, we may have a path to hold Walmart accountable as the seller.
The “Waiver” Myth: Why Your Signature Isn’t a Wall
The most common reason Kurten parents don’t call a lawyer after a trampoline injury is the belief that the waiver they signed means they “can’t sue.”
This is the biggest lie in the industry.
In Texas, waivers are governed by the Dresser / Page Petroleum “Fair Notice” Doctrine. For a waiver to even be considered enforceable, it must be conspicuous (larger font, bold, or contrasting color) and specifically use the word negligence. Furthermore, Texas law—specifically the landmark case of Munoz v. II Jaz Inc.—has long held that a parent cannot pre-emptively waive a minor child’s personal injury claim against a commercial entity. Your child’s rights are their own. You cannot sign them away at a Bryan or College Station kiosk.
Perhaps most importantly, no waiver in any state protects a park from Gross Negligence. In Harris County, the Cosmic Jump $11.485 million verdict proved that if a park knows of a danger (like a torn mat or understaffed courts) and ignores it, the waiver is trash. We analyze your waiver on five different attack vectors—Lupe Peña knows them all because he used to be the one trying to make them stick.
Rhabdomyolysis: The Invisible Emergency in Brazos Valley Parks
If your child spent a Saturday afternoon jumping for two hours straight in an unventilated park in Bryan and arrives home in Kurten with dark-brown, “cola-colored” urine and extreme muscle pain, you are not looking at a “tired kid.” You are looking at a medical emergency called Exertional Rhabdomyolysis.
Rhabdo occurs when muscle tissue breaks down so rapidly that it floods the bloodstream with myoglobin, which then clogs the kidneys. It can lead to acute kidney failure and death. Because we are currently litigating a $10 million rhabdo case against the University of Houston, we have the medical experts and the institutional-accountability framework already in place to win these cases. Most law firms don’t even know to ask about the color of the child’s urine. We do.
What Town of Kurten Families Deserve
Most personal injury firms in Texas handle a trampoline case the way they’d handle any slip-and-fall. We don’t. We built our practice around exactly this fight. Ralph Manginello brings 25+ years of federal court experience and battle-tested tenacity from BP Texas City litigation to your child’s case.
You signed the waiver because the line was long. You let your child jump because you wanted them to have fun. That is not your fault. The park operated below the ASTM F2970 floor because it was more profitable than hiring enough attendants. That is the park’s choice.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911. Hablamos Español. Our offices in Houston, Austin, and Beaumont are the launch point for a national authority in trampoline law.
Frequently Asked Questions for Kurten Residents
Can I sue Jumping World or Urban Air even if I signed the waiver?
Yes. In Texas, the Munoz v. II Jaz ruling makes it clear that a parent’s signature cannot extinguish a minor child’s right to seek justice for their own injuries. Additionally, the Dresser fair-notice doctrine requires waivers to meet strict requirements for word choice and visibility that many Bryan-area kiosks fail to meet. Finally, gross negligence—operating with conscious indifference to safety—voids any waiver. Our $11.485 million Cosmic Jump anchor proves that Texas juries will look past the paper to help the victim.
My child was hurt at a birthday party in Bryan. Who is liable?
Liability can be layered. We identify the local operator LLC, the franchisee, the franchisor (like Urban Air Franchise Holdings), and even the corporate parent. If your child was a guest and you never personally signed a waiver, the park’s defense is even weaker. We also look at the equipment manufacturer—if a harness failed on a Sky Rider or a climbing wall, the manufacturer (such as UA Attractions, LLC or Ropes Courses, Inc.) is also on the hook.
How much is my child’s trampoline injury case worth?
The value is driven by the “LCP”—the Life Care Plan. While typical fracture settlements range from $75,000 to $500,000, catastrophic injuries like TBI or spinal cord damage can reach $5 million to $15 million and beyond. We calculate the next 40 to 60 years of medical monitoring, potential future surgeries, lost earning capacity, and the special education accommodations your child may need. As client Donald Wilcox said, “One company said they would not accept my case. Then I got a call from Manginello… I got a call to come pick up this handsome check.”
What happens if the trampoline park is near a major university like Texas A&M?
Proximity to a university like Texas A&M often means higher park traffic and a staff made up entirely of students who handle high-volume crowds with minimal supervision. Our experience with the $10 million University of Houston hazing case gives us a specific edge in litigating against institutions where student-safety protocols fail. We know how to depose young staff members to uncover the lack of training the franchisor claims didn’t happen.
Does homeowners insurance in Kurten cover trampoline accidents?
Many Kurten homeowners’ policies have a specific trampoline exclusion. If your policy excludes it, we look to your umbrella policy or pursue the manufacturer directly. If your child was injured at a neighbor’s house, we also explore whether the neighbor’s carrier is acting in bad faith by denying the claim, using the Texas Stowers Doctrine to create settlement leverage.
How do I recognize rhabdomyolysis after my child visits a park?
Watch for “the cola sign”—dark, tea-colored urine—along with extreme muscle swelling and listlessness. This typically manifests 12 to 48 hours after the jump session. Go to the ER in Bryan or College Station immediately and demand a Creatine Kinase (CK) test. If the levels are high, your child’s kidneys are in danger. Call us the moment they are stable.
Why is the 7-to-30-day window so important?
Surveillance DVRs in facilities near Kurten overwrite quickly. Foam pits get “fluffed” or refilled, which changes the evidence of how deep they were at the moment of impact. Breaking springs are replaced overnight. By calling 1-888-ATTY-911 in the first week, you allow us to send a formal spoliation demand that legally forces the park to “freeze” this evidence. In the Mathew Knight Georgia case, a $3.5 million verdict was reached after the park’s video “glitched” on four cameras at once—the jury inferred the evidence was destroyed purposefully.
What if my child has a growth plate injury?
A Salter-Harris fracture is an injury to the growth plate. It is serious because it can cause the bone to stop growing or grow at an angle. Your child will need to see an orthopedic specialist every six months for years. We include the cost of this decade-long monitoring in our demand, ensuring you don’t settle for a “broken leg” price when you have a lifelong growth complication.
Do you speak Spanish at your firm?
Sí. El abogado Lupe Peña habla español perfectamente y representa a sus clientes directamente. No usamos intérpretes ni traductores que retrasen su caso. Hablamos con usted en su idioma y le explicamos sus derechos bajo la ley de Texas. Llame al 1-888-ATTY-911 y pida hablar con Lupe.
What is the cost to hire Attorney911?
Zero upfront. We work on a contingency fee. We advance every dollar for the biomechanical engineers and medical specialists. We only get paid if you win. If we don’t recover money for you, you don’t owe us a cent. Your child’s recovery fund stays completely intact.
The Final Authority for Kurten Families
Attorney911 is based in Texas but serves as a national authority on trampoline injury law. Ralph Manginello’s 25+ years of experience and Lupe Peña’s insider knowledge of insurance defense tactics make us the firm corporate parents fear. We’ve gone toe-to-toe with Fortune 500 giants like BP and Walmart. The venture capital groups owning Sky Zone and Urban Air don’t intimidate us; we’ve already beaten their playbook.
Your child’s case depends on what is preserved this week. The DVR overwrites. The attendant transfers. The incident report is “updated.” Our offices in Houston, Austin, and Beaumont are ready to launch your investigation today.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911. Hablamos Español. No fee unless we win. The case starts now.
