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Parents Of Teen Girl Who Died At Rave Sue Live Nation, L.A. County Fair Assn.
The parents of a teenage girl who died at a rave in Pomona last year have filed a claim against the L.A. County Fair Association and Live Nation.
Katie Dix, 19, died of a drug overdose while attending HARD Summer at the Pomona Fairgrounds in August of 2015. She was found unresponsive and later suffered a heart attack after taking what, according to the suit, she believed was "pure Molly." Her parents, Mark and Pamela Dix, filed the suit Friday in L.A. Superior Court, claiming that event promoter Live Nation and the L.A. County Fair Association failed to protect guests from illegal drugs, which they should have known such an event would attract, the L.A. Times reports. The suit also alleges that L.A. County was negligent in that it allowed "a dangerous condition" to occur on its property.
The suit alleged that due to the low number of staff compared to the high number of attendees, medical response was slow. Had it been more timely, the Dixes believe their daughter might have survived.
Katie Dix was one of two drug-related fatalities at last summer's event, and an additional 49 people were sent to emergency rooms. The deaths inspired L.A. County to consider a temporary ban on raves, similar to one imposed at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum after a teen girl died at an event in 2010. Several ER doctors were in support of a ban, saying that the combination of dancing, high temperatures and drug and alcohol use makes raves extremely dangerous. Dr. Brian Johnston, chair of the emergency medicine department at White Memorial Medical Center, said that he was seeing teenagers brought into the hospital suffering heart attacks. "You don't see that from other events. This is a different kind of animal," he said.
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In March, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors ultimately decided not to ban raves, instead deciding to impose an ordinance that allows each "mass gathering" to be evacuated case-by-case, according to Fox 11.
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