Stella Awards

by littlerockguy 17 years ago 4 Replies latest 17 years ago social current

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  littlerockguy 17 years ago

  Got this in my email today. I hope I never get called to be a juror in some cases like this.

  These are ridiculous - the real morons appear to be the jury members.

  It's time once again to review the winners of the annual "Stella Awards."
  
  The "Stella Awards" are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who
  spilled hot coffee on herself and success-fully sued McDonald's (in New
  Mexico ). That case inspired the Stella Awards for the most frivolous and ridiculous, yet successful, lawsuits in the United States . Here are this year's winners:
  
  7th Place : Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $80,000 by >> a jury after breaking her ankle when she tripped over a
  toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the >> store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering that >> the misbehaving little toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.
  
  6th Place: Nineteen-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 >> and medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord . Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hubcaps. 5th Place: Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not
  able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, so Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the home owners' insurance company, claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000. In my opinion, this is SO outrageous that it should have been 2nd Place. 4th Place: Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next-door neighbors' beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owners' fenced yard. The award was less than originally sought, because the jury felt that the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who had climbed over the fence into the yard and was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun. 3rd Place A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink can and broke hercoccyx (tail bone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.
  2nd Place: Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies' room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses. 1st Place (drum roll, please): This year's runaway winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City,Oklahoma. Mrs. Grazinski purchased a brand-new, 32-foot-long Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home from an OU football game -- having driven onto the freeway -- she set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the driver's seat to go into the back to make herself a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the RV left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mrs.Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising her in the owner's manual that she couldn't actually do that. The jury awarded her $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed its
  manuals on the basis of this law suit, just in case there were any other complete morons left around

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  BabaYaga 17 years ago

  You'll be very happy (if not fully entertained) to know that these are NOT real lawsuits. Bogus, fabricated, invented... but you can still get ticked about the hot coffee McDonald's one!
  
  See it here on Snope's, the urban legend de-bunking site:
  
  http://www.snopes.com/legal/lawsuits.asp
  
  Personally, I'm really GLAD they're fake... I don't want to be more pissed at the world than I already am!

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  SixofNine 17 years ago

  Re: the McDonald's hot coffee lawsuit. It was punitive damages equaling only 2 days of McD's coffee sales. I remember when McD's and some BurgerKings would serve coffee that was outrageously, dangerously, hot.

  from http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm :

  There is a lot of hype about the McDonalds' scalding coffee case. No one is in favor of frivolous cases of outlandish results; however, it is important to understand some points that were not reported in most of the stories about the case. McDonalds coffee was not only hot, it was scalding -- capable of almost instantaneous destruction of skin, flesh and muscle.

  Here's the whole story. Stella Liebeck of Albuquerque, New Mexico, was in the passenger seat of her grandson's car when she was severely burned by McDonalds' coffee in February 1992. Liebeck, 79 at the time, ordered coffee that was served in a styrofoam cup at the drivethrough window of a local McDonalds. After receiving the order, the grandson pulled his car forward and stopped momentarily so that Liebeck could add cream and sugar to her coffee. (Critics of civil justice, who have pounced on this case, often charge that Liebeck was driving the car or that the vehicle was in motion when she spilled the coffee; neither is true.) Liebeck placed the cup between her knees and attempted to remove the plastic lid from the cup. As she removed the lid, the entire contents of the cup spilled into her lap.

  The sweatpants Liebeck was wearing absorbed the coffee and held it next to her skin. A vascular surgeon determined that Liebeck suffered full thickness burns (or third-degree burns) over 6 percent of her body, including her inner thighs, perineum, buttocks, and genital and groin areas. She was hospitalized for eight days, during which time she underwent skin grafting. Liebeck, who also underwent debridement treatments, sought to settle her claim for $20,000, but McDonalds refused.

  During discovery, McDonalds produced documents showing more than 700 claims by people burned by its coffee between 1982 and 1992. Some claims involved third-degree burns substantially similar to Liebecks. This history documented McDonalds' knowledge about the extent and nature of this hazard. McDonalds also said during discovery that, based on a consultants advice, it held its coffee at between 180 and 190 degrees fahrenheit to maintain optimum taste. He admitted that he had not evaluated the safety ramifications at this temperature. Other establishments sell coffee at substantially lower temperatures, and coffee served at home is generally 135 to 140 degrees. Further, McDonalds' quality assurance manager testified that the company actively enforces a requirement that coffee be held in the pot at 185 degrees, plus or minus five degrees. He also testified that a burn hazard exists with any food substance served at 140 degrees or above, and that McDonalds coffee, at the temperature at which it was poured into styrofoam cups, was not fit for consumption because it would burn the mouth and throat. The quality assurance manager admitted that burns would occur, but testified that McDonalds had no intention of reducing the "holding temperature" of its coffee. Plaintiffs' expert, a scholar in thermodynamics applied to human skin burns, testified that liquids, at 180 degrees, will cause a full thickness burn to human skin in two to seven seconds. Other testimony showed that as the temperature decreases toward 155 degrees, the extent of the burn relative to that temperature decreases exponentially. Thus, if Liebeck's spill had involved coffee at 155 degrees, the liquid would have cooled and given her time to avoid a serious burn.

  McDonalds asserted that customers buy coffee on their way to work or home, intending to consume it there. However, the companys own research showed that customers intend to consume the coffee immediately while driving. McDonalds also argued that consumers know coffee is hot and that its customers want it that way. The company admitted its customers were unaware that they could suffer thirddegree burns from the coffee and that a statement on the side of the cup was not a "warning" but a "reminder" since the location of the writing would not warn customers of the hazard. The jury awarded Liebeck $200,000 in compensatory damages. This amount was reduced to $160,000 because the jury found Liebeck 20 percent at fault in the spill. The jury also awarded Liebeck $2.7 million in punitive damages, which equals about two days of McDonalds' coffee sales.

  Post-verdict investigation found that the temperature of coffee at the local Albuquerque McDonalds had dropped to 158 degrees fahrenheit. The trial court subsequently reduced the punitive award to $480,000 -- or three times compensatory damages -- even though the judge called McDonalds' conduct reckless, callous and willful.

  No one will ever know the final ending to this case. The parties eventually entered into a secret settlement which has never been revealed to the public, despite the fact that this was a public case, litigated in public and subjected to extensive media reporting. Such secret settlements, after public trials, should not be condoned. -----

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  BabaYaga 17 years ago

  Weird.
  
  Interesting reading, Six, thanks. Always like to hear the OTHER side of the story.
  
  But all of the other lawsuits in that long line-up? Fake. WooHOOoooo!!!!

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  AudeSapere 17 years ago

  OK. Those mentioned in the opening post may not be actual Stella citations but many reallife cases nearly mirror them.

  Here's a link to site that seems to check their facts pretty well: http://www.stellaawards.com/

  -Aude.

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