Smitty Two wrote:
In article ,
"Mike Marlow" wrote:

Or, the McDonald's coffee lawsuit.

Uh, I'd venture that 99.9% of the people who bring this up as a
supposed example of a frivolous lawsuit, actually have never heard
the real story.

Fact 1: The woman received THIRD DEGREE burns. The coffee was FAR
hotter than any reasonable restaurant ever serves it. This was a
deliberate ploy to reduce requests for refills, as the stuff couldn't
even be sipped for 10-15 minutes.

You don't need caps to emphasize your point. Most people here can read just
fine. But - since we are talking about facts, the coffee in that case was
not far hotter than most restaurants serve it - it was simply hotter. It
was within (at the high end, but within) the temperature range that is
considered proper for coffee - especially to go, for proper flavor.
Indeed - it was hot and MacDonalds had settled previous claims out of court
that were not so dissimilar to this one.



Fact 2: The woman asked McD's to pay her medical bills, which IIRC
were a couple of hundred dollars.


Nope. The fact is that she initially sought something in the neighborhood
of $20,000. That was to cover he medical costs at that time, lost wages,
and anticipated additional medial costs. McD's refused to go more than
$800.


Fact 3: She brought suit only AFTER McD refused to pay the paltry
medical bills.

That's close enough not to dispute.

Your point is well enough taken, but it would serve better in a different
argument. In this case, the lady put a styrofoam cup with a plastic lid
between her legs - one that she knew was as hot as it was, and attempted to
remove the lid to add cream and sugar. A risky proposition at best, since
the possibility of crushing or deforming a styrofoam cup is higher than the
possibility of not doing so.

I raised that incident with reference to people doing things and then
casting the blame for the results on others. She did a bonehead thing and
McD paid for it - although not as much as the original jury award.

--

-Mike-