Lewis
Member
April 13th, 2012
NFL TV-star Alex Karras joins concussion suit
Alex Karras, the former Detroit Lions standout who starred in the 1980s sitcom “Webster†- and whose wife says is now suffering from dementia - has joined fellow ex-NFL players suing the league over concussion-related injuries.
Karras, who also played the horse-punching Mongo in the 1974 movie “Blazing Saddles," is the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit filed Thursday in federal court in Philadelphia on behalf of him and 69 other former NFL players.
Karras, 76, of California, “sustained repetitive traumatic impacts to his head and/or concussions on multiple occasions†during his NFL career, and “suffers from various neurological conditions and symptoms related to the multiple head traumas,†the lawsuit says.
The suit – the 12th concussion-related complaint filed against the NFL by the Locks Law Firm in Philadelphia, now representing about 700 former NFL players– alleges that the league didn’t do enough to warn players that they risked permanent brain damage if they played too soon after a concussion, and that it concealed evidence about the risks for decades.
The suits claim that plaintiffs suffer from neurological problems after sustaining traumatic impacts to the head.
In May, scientists announced that an autopsy of the brain of former Chicago Bears safety David Duerson, 50, who died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, showed evidence of "moderately advanced" chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE.
CTE is a degenerative, dementia-like brain disease linked to repeated brain trauma. The disease has been found in the brains of 14 of 15 former NFL players, including Duerson, studied at the Boston University School of Medicine Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy as of last May. Their cases share a common thread – repeated concussions, sub-concussive blows to the head, or both.
A brain with CTE is riddled with dense clumps of a protein called tau. Under a microscope, tau appears as brown tangles that look similar to dementia. But the cases of CTE have shown this progressive, dementia-like array in players well in advance of a typical dementia diagnosis, which typically occurs when people are in their 70s or 80s.
CNN