The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#1
Posted: 12/15/10 at 10:13pm
All I can say is AMAZING.
STELLA AWARDS
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 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 Stellas for the past year:
*SEVENTH 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.
Start scratching!
* SIXTH 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 hubcaps.
Scratch some more...
* FIFTH PLACE *
Terrence Dickson, of Bristol , Pennsylvania , who 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 and survive 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....
Double hand scratching after this one...
*FOURTH 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.
Pick a new spot to scratch, you're getting a bald spot..
* THIRD PLACE *
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?
Only two more so ease up on the scratching....
*SECOND 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.
Ok Here we go!!
* FIRST PLACE *
This year's runaway First Place Stella Award winner was: Mrs. Merv Grazinski, of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, who purchased new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home, from an OU football game, having driven on to 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.
Are we, as a society,
.....................getting more stupid...?
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/4/07
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#2
Posted: 12/16/10 at 6:34am
Oh.
My.
God.
Truly frightening and thanks for posting.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#2
Posted: 12/16/10 at 6:37am
[Obligatory post on how Stella Liebeck actually suffered incredibly serious burns requiring skin grafts on her thighs and genitals due to McDonald's consistently serving coffee that was DANGEROUSLY hot; y'all should look into the story some time and not assume she was just an idiot with a stupid lawsuit.]
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#3
Posted: 12/16/10 at 6:40am
We're not necessarily more stupid, but certainly more gullible. From truthorfiction.com :
"TruthOrFiction.com has checked court records and news archives for the cities mentioned, and have not found any documentation for any of these stories."
The last one, about the RV, has circulated in many forms for years. Sometimes it's the wife. Sometimes it's the husband. Bottom line: never happened.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#4
Posted: 12/16/10 at 10:28am
It just takes a little digging.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#5
Posted: 12/16/10 at 10:39amOh and I wish to reiterate Weez's obligatory post. Yes, putting the coffee between her legs was stupid, but boiling coffee in your girlie parts is not what your expecting. Hot? Yes. Boiling? No. When I was 12, I was at the hospital when my cousin was having a baby. It was late into the night and my mom and I went to grab some coffee in the cafeteria. I grabbed a lid for the large styrofoam cup they served me and gently pushed it on. It's also important to know that the counter was exactly chest high on a girl who was probably about 5'7" at the time. The coffee was so hot that the side of the cup caved and it poured down my chest. I screamed bloody murder and my mom thought I was overreacting. A doctor who was in the cafeteria scooped me up and ran me down to the ER. I had second degree burns over most of my chest with three smaller areas, totaling the size of a nickel, determined to be third degree. We didn't sue, but we were surprised to find we never got a doctor bill or notification from our health insurance. I am sure they were trying to avoid a suit.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#6
Posted: 12/16/10 at 12:06pm
"Are we, as a society,
.....................getting more stupid...?"
Absolutely ! Which is why all those fabricated emails keep circulating year after year, all because people don't bother checking them before hitting that send button.
(wondering how many copies if this email I'll get in the next few weeks).
Joined: 12/31/69
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#7
Posted: 12/16/10 at 12:24pmAbsolutely everything about this is false. The only problem with the world today is that people believe this crap...
Joined: 12/31/69
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#8
Posted: 12/16/10 at 12:31pm
If you don't check out an email before forwarding it (or posting it) you have no one to blame but yourself.
It really only takes a minute
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#9
Posted: 12/16/10 at 12:51pmI've heard tell of lawsuits incredibly similar to all of these but instead of a furniture store it was a walmart in arkansas, and it was an arabic man who bought the winnebago. All were more than 5 years ago.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#10
Posted: 12/16/10 at 2:50pmYou know what? I read and heeded all your posts, however, in all honesty, I received this (cute) e-mail from my favorite Uncle, and just re-posted it here because I thought it was funny. I don't pre - analyze everything, but OK...no prob.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#11
Posted: 12/16/10 at 3:06pmMcDonalds blatanty and arrogantly continued to ignore previous warnings and fines that they were serving coffee that would scald a human being..NO ONE with coffee spilled on them should ever end up with a skin graft. Yet McDonalds manages to end up looking like the victim in this story. The poor comapany that had to pay a dumb lady for spilling coffee. Unbelievable.
Joined: 12/31/69
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#12
Posted: 12/16/10 at 3:18pm
But this is how we end up with a world where everyone "knows" that Al Gore claimed to invent the internet or that Obama is a Muslim. To you it may be a harmless giggle but this screed is propaganda, plain and simple. It's part of the right wing machine, designed to teach people their government is inefficient and if we'd just leave businesses alone everything would be great.
As people have pointed out- the "facts" that circulate about the McDonald's coffee lawsuit have been re-purposed to serve as anti-lawyer, anti-consumer propaganda, when in fact, McDonald's would STILL be serving flesh-searingly hot coffee today if they hadn't been sued.
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#13
Posted: 12/16/10 at 3:25pmWhat is cute about a bunch of lies ?
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/10/04
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#14
Posted: 12/16/10 at 4:23pmJoined: 12/31/69
The STELLA Awards. I just LOVE the justice system...don't you? lol.#15
Posted: 12/16/10 at 4:42pm
Or this....
Amazing how a lawyer can spin those same facts...
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