Lawsuit Awards

[Optom]

Hello,

I am glad no optical is listed here. Read these interesting lawsuit awards:


ANNUAL STELLA AWARDS

Once again, it's time to review the winners of the Annual Stella
Awards.
The Stella's are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffee on herself & successfully sued McDonalds. That case
inspired the Stella Awards for the most frivolous successful
lawsuits in the United States. Unfortunately, the most recent lawsuit implicating McDonalds & the teens who allege that eating at McDonalds has made them fat, was filed after the 2002 award voting was closed. This suit will, undoubtedly, top the 2003 awards list.

~*~
5th place
(tied)
Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were surprised at the
verdict, considering the misbehaving toddler was Ms Robertson's son.

~*~
5th place
(tied)
19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles, California, won $74,000 & medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently did not notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he
was trying to steal the hubcaps.

~*~
5th place
(tied)
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 could not re-enter the house because the door connecting the house & garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family were on vacation & Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for 8 days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found & a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the house owners insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

~*~
4th place
Jerry Williams of Little Rock,
Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 & medical expenses after being bitten on the legs by his next door neighbor's Beagle dog. The Beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been a little provoked at the time, as Mr. Williams who had climbed over the fence into the yard, 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 & broke
her coccyx (tailbone).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, sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor
& knocked out two of her front teeth. This occurred whilst Ms. Walton
was trying to crawl through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 & dental expenses.

~*~
1st Place
This year's runaway winner was Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new Winnebago Motor Home. On his trip home from an OU football game, having driven onto the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70 mph & calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back & make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly, the vehicle left the freeway, crashed & then overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising him, by reading the owner's manual, that he actually could not do this.The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new Winnebago Motor Home.
The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit just in case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.


Do you know of any interesting optical lawsuits,please post us here.

Regards,
Optom

[Blake]

Recently a jury here awarded $100,000 to a woman who was locked in a storage facility for two months. From what was reported, it was obvious that she was living there (she had been evicted from her apartment and had all her belongings, including food and drink, in there). The security guard had come by, noticed the door unlocked, and when nobody answered locked it. It was 11:00 at night.
When she was "rescued" 63 days later, the smell was so bad she had to be quarantined. After the trial, it was revealed that she had mental problems (can we say "duh!"?).
She had sued for 10 million, so I guess it could have been worse. I wonder if the storage facility had to put a "you can't live here" clause in their lease contracts...

I do remember seeing a case on the People's Court where an optician in NYC sued a lab owner, but I can't remember the details...

[Optom]

So this homeless woman would now be in position to buy a decent 2 bedroom condominium after suffering for 68 days,not bad;)
Rgd,
Optom

[varmint]

Got to comment on a couple.
-This moron didn't figure out you can release a garage door from it's opener by pulling on a handle haging in front of your face?

-maybe they need kill switches on motorhomes like they put on a boat so it turns off the ignition when you decide to get up & walk away while driving.

[hcjilson]

I know this story is true because it happened to me.

I sold an optical business to an Optician refered to me by a frame manufacturer.The price was rock bottom because I needed the funds in a hurry. It was December of 1989.

I don't know if you remember what happened at that time but the country went into recession and the bottom dropped out of business, not just the optical business but all businesses.

I received notification that the buyer was suing me for 350K claiming I had misrepresented the business. He was asking for treble damages. After a 2 years, the case came to trial which lasted the better part of 4 days. He had hired a big Boston law firm and was into them for about 50 K byt the time of the trial. If there ever was a case for a frivolous lawsuit this was it.It was simply a case of buyers remorse.

The last person to testify was the new owner. My attorney questioned him at some length taking advantage of the buyers obvious pomposity. The buyer made the statement that I had over inflated the sales figures in order to make an inflated sales price. Unfortunately for him, the sales figures had been audited by the Mall managing company about 6 months previously. The buyers case fell apart when my lawyer said to the buyer," So what you are telling the jury, Mr. Fosset, is that Mr Jilson over reported his income so that he could pay his landlord more rent, and pay the government more taxes" Fosset replied that was exactly what he had said.

At almost the same time, the judge, the jury, and the spectators burst out into laughter. After a long trial, the jury was out less than 20 minutes. I was not guilty.
It was expensive for me but much more expensive for him.

The real tradgedy is that he took a thriving business and ran it into the ground. He has since left Cape Cod and good riddence!

hj