CASE 80

Rule 60, Right to Protest; Right to Request Redress or Rule 69 Action
Rule 61.2, Protest Requirements:Protest Contents
Rule 62, Redress

A protest hearing and decision must be limited to a particular incident that has been described in the protest. Without a hearing, a boat may not be penalized for failing to sail the course.

Summary of the Facts
When boat A crossed the finishing line, the race committee scored her DNF because it believed that she had failed to sail the course correctly. A requested redress on the grounds that she was not given a finishing position although she had finished properly. The protest committee did not give A redress, deciding that rule 62 did not apply because A failed to sail the course and that her failure to do so was entirely her own fault and not due to an act or omission of the race committee. A appealed.

Decision
Appeal upheld. The race committee erred in summarily scoring A DNF when she did finish according to the definition Finish. The race committee could have scored boat A as DNF only for failing to finish correctly. Since A crossed the finishing line from the direction of the last mark, she should have been recorded as having done so. If a race committee believes from its observations that a boat has not sailed the course as required by rule 28, it may, as permitted by rule 60.2(a), protest the boat for breaking rule 28. In this case, the race committee did not protest A.

A fundamental principle of protest hearing procedure is that a hearing must be limited to a particular ‘incident’, the term used in rule 61.2(b). Rule 61.2 requires that a protest include a description or identify the incident, the lack of which identification cannot be remedied. Similarly, if a protest committee initiates action on its own, rule 61.2 requires that a description of the incident be included in the protest. Since a protest committee must limit any hearing to the incident described in the protest, whether a boat-versus-boat protest, a request for redress or a protest by a committee, any penalty the committee imposes must also be so limited.

When A requested redress, the incident about which she complained was that she had been scored DNF even though she met the definition Finish. When the protest committee considered whether or not A sailed the course, it improperly expanded the hearing beyond the incident that was the subject of A’s request for redress.

In summary, the facts indicate that A finished according to the definition Finish. Therefore, she should not have been scored DNF and was entitled to redress for an improper action of the race committee. Because A had not been protested for failing to sail the course, she could not be penalized for that failure. For these reasons, the decision of the protest committee is reversed and A is to be scored as having finished at the time she crossed the finishing line.

USSA 1993/289