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 Posted:
Thu Apr 24, 2008 9:34 pm
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Forum Medic
Joined: 15 Apr 2007
Posts: 129
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It's time again for the annual 'Stella Awards'! For those unfamiliar with these awards, they are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued the McDonald's in New Mexico where she purchased the coffee. You remember, she took the lid off the coffee and put it between her knees while she was driving.
Who would ever think one could get burned doing that, right?
That's right; these are awards for the most outlandish lawsuits and verdicts in the U.S. You know, the kinds of cases that make you scratch your head. So keep your head scratcher handy.
Here are the Stella's for the past year:
7TH PLACE:
Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas was awarded $80,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The store owners were understandably surprised by the verdict, considering the running toddler was her own son.
6TH PLACE:
Carl Truman, 19, of Los Angeles, California won $74,000 plus medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hub caps.
Go ahead, grab your head scratcher.
5TH PLACE:
Terrence Dickson, of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just burglarized by way of the garage. Unfortunately for Dickson, the automatic garage door opener malfunctioned and he could not get the garage door to open. Worse, he couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the garage to the house locked when Dickson pulled it shut. Forced to sit for eight, count 'em, EIGHT, days on a case of Pepsi and a large bag of dry dog food, he sued the homeowner's insurance company claiming undue mental Anguish. Amazingly, the jury said the insurance company must pay Dickson $500,000 for his anguish. We should all have this kind of anguish.
Keep scratching. There are more...
4TH PLACE:
Jerry Williams, of Little Rock, Arkansas, garnered 4th Place in the Stella's when he was awarded $14,500 plus medical expenses after being bitten on the butt by his next door neighbor's beagle - even though the beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. Williams did not get as much as he asked for because the jury believed the beagle might have been provoked at the time of the butt bite because Williams had climbed over the fence into the yard and repeatedly shot the dog with a pellet gun.
Grrrrr ... Scratch, scratch.
3RD PLACE:
Third place goes to Amber Carson of Lancaster , Pennsylvania because a jury ordered a Philadelphia restaurant to pay her $113,500 after she slipped on a spilled soft drink and broke her tailbone. The reason the soft drink was on the floor: Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.
What ever happened to people being responsible for their own actions?
Scratch, scratch, scratch. Hang in there; there are only two more Stella’s to go...
2ND PLACE :
Kara Walton, of Claymont, Delaware sued the owner of a night club in a nearby city because she fell from the bathroom window to the floor, knocking out her two front teeth. Even though Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the ladies room window to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge, the jury said the night club had to pay her $12,000....oh, yeah, plus dental expenses. Go figure.
1ST PLACE: (May I have a fanfare played on 50 kazoos please?)
This year's runaway First Place Stella Award winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski, of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, who purchased a new 32-foot 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 to the back of the Winnebago to make herself a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the motor home left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Also not surprisingly, Mrs. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not putting in the owner's manual that she couldn't actually leave the driver's seat while the cruise control was set. The Oklahoma jury awarded her, are you sitting down, $1,750,000 PLUS a new motor home. Winnebago actually changed their manuals as a result of this suit, just in case Mrs. Grazinski has any relatives who might also buy a motor home. |
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| Posted:
Thu Apr 24, 2008 10:06 pm
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 05 Oct 2005
Posts: 1172
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| Koopsta Knicca wrote: |
| It's time again for the annual 'Stella Awards'! For those unfamiliar with these awards, they are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued the McDonald's in New Mexico where she purchased the coffee. You remember, she took the lid off the coffee and put it between her knees while she was driving. |
While yes there are stupid cases, this one in fact was not. obviously everyone just wants to go "OH NOES COFFEE IS HOT, YOU MUST BE STUPID" without having any idea the facts of the case. The fact was that mcdonalds coffee averaged about 25 degrees hotter than other places coffee sometimes reaching 50 degrees hotter. At this temperature you can receive 3rd degree burns(which are the worst kind for those that dont know) within seconds. Also prior to this case there had been 700 other burn cases that just got settled out of court but mcdonalds never changed their coffee temperatures. All stella wanted was for mcdonalds to pay for her medical expenses and that was it however she was awarded 2.7 million to punish mcdonalds, not to award stella. You can put the hand scratcher away for the stella case  |
_________________
0:00:35 IsLeS PiPeS-[AF] HW NO CONC AIM - said over enemy team_chat about Yur_Mom 35 seconds into the match 
-[CfH]-Server Admin |
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Fri Apr 25, 2008 2:31 am
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 25 Nov 2004
Posts: 4336
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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adding to the mcdonalds case, at least in terms of appeals to emotion, her labia fused to her sweatpants.
also all those lawsuits never even happened.
don't believe every fowarded e-mail you get people. (hint: obama isn't a secret muslim either) |
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| Posted:
Fri Apr 25, 2008 2:34 pm
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 07 Feb 2005
Posts: 3150
Location: Houston
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| tiger wrote: |
| At this temperature you can receive 3rd degree burns(which are the worst kind for those that dont know) within seconds. |
Actually 6th degree burns are the worst.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burn_(injury)#Classification_by_degree
Url tags aren't working for me. So deal with the text.(I guess it doesn't believe that's a real url or something) |
_________________
RL the ultimate roleplaying experience |
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| Posted:
Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:03 pm
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 05 Oct 2005
Posts: 1172
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| Demasu wrote: |
| tiger wrote: |
| At this temperature you can receive 3rd degree burns(which are the worst kind for those that dont know) within seconds. |
Actually 6th degree burns are the worst.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burn_(injury)#Classification_by_degree
Url tags aren't working for me. So deal with the text.(I guess it doesn't believe that's a real url or something) |
hmm you would think id have known that but i have yet to have heard about those |
_________________
0:00:35 IsLeS PiPeS-[AF] HW NO CONC AIM - said over enemy team_chat about Yur_Mom 35 seconds into the match
-[CfH]-Server Admin |
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| Posted:
Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:28 pm
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 07 Feb 2005
Posts: 3150
Location: Houston
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| tiger wrote: |
| Demasu wrote: |
| tiger wrote: |
| At this temperature you can receive 3rd degree burns(which are the worst kind for those that dont know) within seconds. |
Actually 6th degree burns are the worst.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burn_(injury)#Classification_by_degree
Url tags aren't working for me. So deal with the text.(I guess it doesn't believe that's a real url or something) |
hmm you would think id have known that but i have yet to have heard about those |
It's mainly because they're not too common. Third degree burns will easily kill you if they're on a great enough surface area though. |
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RL the ultimate roleplaying experience |
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| Posted:
Fri Apr 25, 2008 7:42 pm
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 08 Dec 2004
Posts: 2750
Location: Maryland
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| tiger wrote: |
| hmm you would think id have known that but i have yet to have heard about those |
Thats because its easier to just say they're dead. |
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Sat Apr 26, 2008 9:07 am
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 26 Feb 2005
Posts: 1131
Location: East Coast - New Jersey
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NOT REAL???? Dammit, and I already picked out the color of my Winnebago. DAMMIT !!!!  |
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-[CfH]-Server Admin |
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Sat Apr 26, 2008 11:08 am
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Forum Medic
Joined: 15 Apr 2007
Posts: 129
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| Toughsox wrote: |
| NOT REAL???? Dammit, and I already picked out the color of my Winnebago. DAMMIT !!!! |
heheh |
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| Posted:
Sat May 03, 2008 11:03 am
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Forum H4xor
Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 1290
Location: Stan Mikita's Donuts
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| Koopsta Knicca wrote: |
It's time again for the annual 'Stella Awards'! For those unfamiliar with these awards, they are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued the McDonald's in New Mexico where she purchased the coffee. You remember, she took the lid off the coffee and put it between her knees while she was driving.
Who would ever think one could get burned doing that, right?
That's right; these are awards for the most outlandish lawsuits and verdicts in the U.S. You know, the kinds of cases that make you scratch your head. So keep your head scratcher handy.
Here are the Stella's for the past year:
7TH PLACE:
Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas was awarded $80,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The store owners were understandably surprised by the verdict, considering the running toddler was her own son.
6TH PLACE:
Carl Truman, 19, of Los Angeles, California won $74,000 plus medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hub caps.
Go ahead, grab your head scratcher.
5TH PLACE:
Terrence Dickson, of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just burglarized by way of the garage. Unfortunately for Dickson, the automatic garage door opener malfunctioned and he could not get the garage door to open. Worse, he couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the garage to the house locked when Dickson pulled it shut. Forced to sit for eight, count 'em, EIGHT, days on a case of Pepsi and a large bag of dry dog food, he sued the homeowner's insurance company claiming undue mental Anguish. Amazingly, the jury said the insurance company must pay Dickson $500,000 for his anguish. We should all have this kind of anguish.
Keep scratching. There are more...
4TH PLACE:
Jerry Williams, of Little Rock, Arkansas, garnered 4th Place in the Stella's when he was awarded $14,500 plus medical expenses after being bitten on the butt by his next door neighbor's beagle - even though the beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. Williams did not get as much as he asked for because the jury believed the beagle might have been provoked at the time of the butt bite because Williams had climbed over the fence into the yard and repeatedly shot the dog with a pellet gun.
Grrrrr ... Scratch, scratch.
3RD PLACE:
Third place goes to Amber Carson of Lancaster , Pennsylvania because a jury ordered a Philadelphia restaurant to pay her $113,500 after she slipped on a spilled soft drink and broke her tailbone. The reason the soft drink was on the floor: Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.
What ever happened to people being responsible for their own actions?
Scratch, scratch, scratch. Hang in there; there are only two more Stella’s to go...
2ND PLACE :
Kara Walton, of Claymont, Delaware sued the owner of a night club in a nearby city because she fell from the bathroom window to the floor, knocking out her two front teeth. Even though Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the ladies room window to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge, the jury said the night club had to pay her $12,000....oh, yeah, plus dental expenses. Go figure.
1ST PLACE: (May I have a fanfare played on 50 kazoos please?)
This year's runaway First Place Stella Award winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski, of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, who purchased a new 32-foot 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 to the back of the Winnebago to make herself a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the motor home left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Also not surprisingly, Mrs. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not putting in the owner's manual that she couldn't actually leave the driver's seat while the cruise control was set. The Oklahoma jury awarded her, are you sitting down, $1,750,000 PLUS a new motor home. Winnebago actually changed their manuals as a result of this suit, just in case Mrs. Grazinski has any relatives who might also buy a motor home. |
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