A young boy and his mother are suing Hockey Canada, Hockey Quebec, and Hockey Bas St. Laurent after he suffered a serious, life-altering concussion during a peewee match about three years ago.

Now 14, Alexis Turcotte was 11 years old when he was taken off the ice in a stretcher following a series of illegal hits during a game.

The lawsuit alleges organizations, including Hockey Quebec and Hockey Canada, tolerate hockey violence that's against their own rules. The Turcottes are suing for $375,000, which includes $50,000 as punitive damages against the family of the boy that hit Alexis.

"I saw that Alexis wasn't moving on the ice," recalled the boy's mother Annie Turcotte.

The play had stopped when another boy came up to Alexis and cross-checked him in the back, knocking him to the ground, explained their lawyer Jean-Pierre Menard.

When Alexis stood up, the boy hit him in the face with his stick.

For his offence, the other player received a two-minute penalty, despite head shots being a clear violation of the rules.

Alexis was sent to hospital and says he has suffered severely over the past three years. His family says Alexis has missed a lot of school because of the injury, and he can no longer play hockey or other contact sports.

"I stayed in my room away from noise and light and had terrible headaches," said Alexis.

Menard, who says this is the first civil case of its kind against hockey leagues, says the organizations have created a tolerance of violence and actually encourage concussions.

Menard said it's obvious the organizations are not even paying lip service to their own rules and regulations.

"These organizations have an important responsibilty when they issue a regulation to make sure the regulations are complied with," said Menard.

"Up to now, even if these regulations are there, what we saw is that nobody's really paying attention to those regulations... Because of the tolerance these organizations have developed towards those kinds of incidents, they have created the conditions for such an incident. It's very important that publicly, legally those organizations be liable."

Neither Hockey Canada nor Hockey Quebec would comment on the case.

The suit comes the same week as ten former NHL players filed suit in the U.S. claiming the NHL has not done enough to stop concussions in professional sports.