One, if it were that easy to make $3,000,000, we'd all be wealthy. The facts reported are incomplete and isolated craziness can be found in any legal system.Blind groper wrote:This is a query for our American posters. Is your legal system totally off its nut?
Recently I was told of a case in which a woman bought a cup of coffee from MacDonalds, and spilled it on herself, causing burns to her legs. She sued MacDonalds and got compensation of nearly $ 3 million. She claimed the coffee was too hot and that Macdonalds failed to warn her.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v. ... estaurants
Come on guys!
The coffee was too hot? Is she a moron or something? When someone serves me a cup of coffee, I treat it with caution, and allow it to cool down if needed. And the accident was one of her own making. She did the spilling. How the hell was MacDonalds at fault?
$ 3,000,000???
Shit. I would willingly dip my genitals in a hot cup of coffee to get that much money.
Is this normal? Are American judges totally living in fairyland? Is the American legal system insane?
Two, remember, this was a jury case, so those that saw the evidence were able to live with their judgment.
Three, the woman was 79 years old and in the passenger seat of a car, and she suffered 3rd degree burns over 6% of her body because the coffee was hot enough to cause 3rd degree burns.
Four, during the discovery phase of the litigation, it was discovered that McDonald's required franchisees to serve coffee at between 180 and 190 degrees F - that's like 82 to 88 C. Other documents obtained from McDonald's showed that from 1982 to 1992 the company had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000 (from the wiki article you cited).
The jury found McDonald's 80% at fault and the woman 20% at fault resulting in money damages of about $160,000. The jury awarded $2.7 million in punitive damages to punish McDonald's for 1-2 days of coffee revenues because of their negligence. The judge immediately reduced the award to $480,000. During the appeal process the case was settled for some undisclosed amount less than $600,000 total.
So, it's not as bad as all that. Oh, and no it is not "normal."