The retired optometrist suing Gwyneth Paltrow over a 2016 ski collision has testified that he heard the Hollywood star let out a “bloodcurdling scream” before she plowed into him on the slope.
Terry Sanderson, 76, took the stand in court in Park City, Utah, on Monday morning during his high-profile civil trial against the Goop mogul.
During courtroom testimony, Mr Sanderson recalled the moment he claims Paltrow crashed into him on the slope, leaving him with “permanent traumatic brain injury, four broken ribs, pain, suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, emotional distress and disfigurement”.
On 26 February 2016, he said he had joined a ski meet-up group to go to the slope at Deer Valley – a slope he said he had never skied before that day.
Before they set off, he said they were told not to go down the middle of the run because it was busy.
After getting off the ski lift, he said that he followed that guidance and went to the right side of the slope to avoid people.
“It was really a very nice day for skiing,” he said.
Mr Sanderson insisted that there was “no one” in front of him as he went down the slope.
“I remember looking and seeing no one,” he said.
He began seeing multiple “slow down” signs along the slope and so he “backed off”, testifying that he noticed other skiers to his left were going around the same speed as him.
As he continued to make his way down the slope, he claimed that there continued to be no other skiers in front of him and said he was having a “great” time.
Then suddenly, he said he heard a “blood-curdling” scream – a noise that he said he has never heard before in his almost four decades of skiing – before a “boom”.
“It was wide open. There was nothing, nothing in front of me,” he testified.
“And then I heard something I have never heard at a ski resort and that was a bloodcurdling scream.
“I just, I can’t do it,” he said of the noise, before quietly impersonating a screaming sound inside the courtroom.
“And then boom! It was like somebody was out of control and was going to hit a tree and was about to die,” he said of the noise.
The 76-year-old said he then felt a “serious smack” into the back of him.
“I got hit in my back so hard – right in the shoulder blades,” he said.
“A serious, serious smack. Never been hit that hard and I was flying, I’m absolutely flying.”
“All I saw was a whole lot of snow and I didn’t see sky.”
He added: “And I was flying in that sense. I had no control... Then it was like the ground was coming up. I just said okay ‘I’ve got to protect my face and head’. And that’s the last thing I remember. The last thing I remember everything is black.”
He said he “had no idea” if Paltrow landed on top of him saying that the next thing he can remember is hearing a “mad, angry male voice” shouting at him.
Mr Sanderson claimed that Paltrow’s ski instructor shouted at him and blamed him for what happened after the accident.
“I couldn’t hear what he was saying but knew he was mad,” he said.
He then heard the man shouting that it was Mr Sanderson’s fault and that he had “hurt somebody”.
He said it sounded like a “very angry person trying to bully me into something” – leaving him a “little afraid”.
Because of a “need to placate this guy”, he said he mumbled: “I’m sorry.”
Before the accident, Mr Sanderson said that he typically went skiiing two to three times a week as a pasttime he had enjoyed for more than three decades.
He described himself as an advanced to intermediate skier and said he had never been in a ski accident prior to the incident involving Paltrow.
Mr Sanderson, 76, has accused Paltrow of crashing into him on a ski slope at the Deer Valley resort in Park City, Utah, back in February 2016.
He claims the crash left him with “permanent traumatic brain injury, four broken ribs, pain, suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, emotional distress and disfigurement”.
He is seeking more than $300,000 in damages.
Meanwhile, Paltrow claims it was Mr Sanderson who actually crashed into her.
In court on Friday, Paltrow testified that for a brief moment she thought the ski collision was in fact a sexual assault as she felt Mr Sanderson crash into the back of her.
The Oscar winner described how she “froze” as she says his set of skis suddenly “forced my legs apart”.
“His body pressed into my back so I froze, I don’t know how far the skis came through but I felt his body pressing against my back,” she said.
“There was a body pressing against me and there was a very strange, grunting noise,” Ms Paltrow said. “My brain was trying to make sense of what was happening.”
She added: “I thought, is this a practical joke? Is someone doing something perverted? This is very strange.”
Paltrow said she was not in any way accusing Mr Sanderson of sexual assault but had just been “trying to put together what could possibly be going on behind me” in that moment.
Her team has also sought to accuse the 76-year-old of trying to exploit Paltrow’s fame and wealth, with the skier telling his daughter afterwards that he was now “famous”.
She is countersuing for just $1 and for her legal fees to be covered.
Mr Sanderson’s legal team is expected to rest its case after the claimant’s testimony concludes.
Paltrow’s defence will then begin its case, with plans to call the star’s children Moses and Apple to testify.
