It’s been five years since Hard Fest‘s founder Gary Richards sold his company to Live Nation & since then it has faced significant amount of problems under new ownership. According to Spin as of 2013, six people have died attending the summer EDM festival. It was at last year’s Hard Fest at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California where half of those people died, including 22-year-old college student Roxanne Ngo. Spin reports that the parents of the UC Riverside student have filed a lawsuit against Hard Festival a couple of weeks ago on July 31st.
Ngo’s death is believed to be caused by an overdose of MDMA, better known as ecstasy or molly, which has caused her father, Hai Ngo, to sue Hard Fest for negligence and wrongful death charges. The NGO family lawyer Lee Sherman makes the point that Live Nation was ill prepared to deal with overdose related injuries. The lawsuit accuses Live Nation of failing to have property security presence at Hard Fest and argues that their four medical tents were insufficient for the 147,000 people in attendance. The lawsuit also alleges that the event failed to provide enough drinking water at the event, considering that the temperature was past ninety degrees that day. According to Billboard, Live Nation’s spokesman has said that the company does not comment on ongoing lawsuits.
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