§ 94.002.Liability of Sports Official

The protection, with a three-part test for inherent risk and a decisive final subsection.

A sports official engaged in an athletic competition is not liable for civil damages — including personal injury, wrongful death, property damage, or other loss — related to any act, error, or omission that results from a risk inherent in the nature of the competitive activity in which the claimant chose to participate, unless it constitutes gross negligence or wanton, wilful, or intentional misconduct.

"In which the claimant chose to participate" imports assumption of risk without saying so. A participant who entered the competition accepted its inherent risks.

Subsection (b) supplies a three-part test for whether a risk is inherent: the nature of the sport; the conduct that is generally accepted in the sport; and whether the harm occurred during the pursuit of the purposes of the competition.

Contact that is ordinary in one sport is not in another, and the second factor measures against the sport's own norms rather than a general standard.

Subsection (c) is the operative sentence for most claims. A mere violation of the rules of play, or failing to call a penalty, missing a call, or failing to enforce competition rules, cannot in itself form the basis for liability.

That forecloses the claim the chapter was written against — that an official's wrong or missed call caused an injury. Officials get calls wrong constantly, and the section says so cannot found a claim.