The families of the victims of a fatal car crash at this year's South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin, Texas, are suing its organisers. According to AP, the lawsuits accuse them of serious safety lapses. Rashad Charjuan Owens has been in jail on murder charges since March after four people died when his car broke through a barrier at the music, film and interactive festival. The crash, which happened outside the Mohawk venue, also injured 23 people. Among several wrongful deaths lawsuits was one from the family of Steven Craenmehr, a Dutch music executive, who was knocked off his bike. His widow and mother claim that SXSW organisers didn't put enough traffic safeguards on the roads for pedestrians during the event, which sees thousands of bands performing at venues across Austin. "A festival organiser or traffic design consultant of ordinary intelligence would have anticipated the danger," the lawsuit says. Lawyers for SXSW released a statement which read: "What happened on Red River was a terrible tragedy, caused by Rashad Owen's utter disregard of human life.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/30548367
A report by SXSW's own consultants say that the event may have outgrown Austin. South By Southwest, the world's leading showcase event had engaged Populous concluded that, with SXSW's continued rapid growth, various issues need to be addressed by the city to ensure the continued smooth running of the event. According to Texas monthly, the report states that "like any business they [SXSW management] will eventually need to make decisions about whether or not they can continue to exist in their current format and location", adding that SXSW may well "have no choice but to entertain notions of bidding their event to other cities to sustain their business model". Elsewhere in the Populus report there are new proposals to ensure crowd safety including banning buskers from playing while the festival is on, and restricting events that take place near carparks. Another proposal is the creation of a so called 'clean zone' which would be under SXSW's control.
SXSW organisers said in a statement: "We've been careful not to say anything that implies we're trying to ban unofficial events because, even if we could, we wouldn't try to do that. We totally get that unofficial events are part of the appeal of SXSW, though the line between 'official' and 'unofficial' can be hard to distinguish" before adding "But unofficial events need to be managed so to ensure overall safety" and "What we're asking the city to do is put a limit on the number of permits issued for events that require temporary permits, based on location, capacity and infrastructure. The majority of the unofficial events are in existing businesses and this would not affect them" stressing crowd safety was their main consideration.
http://www.spin.com/articles/sxsw-report-may-ban-unofficial-events/
Amateur video has captured the aftermath of the crash at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas, that left two people dead and over 20 others injured, 5 critically. The suspected drunk driver of the car was fleeing from police and crashed at high speed into numerous pedestrians. The driver's car hit a taxi, before the suspect was pursued fleeing on foot and being tasered by police.
Update
Dutch company MassiveMusic have announced the sad news that one of the people killed was its Creative Director Steven Craenmehr. He died after driver Rashad Charjuan Owens crashed into a bike he was riding. The other fatality was reportedly a local woman, who was knocked off her moped.
