Robert M. Gary wrote:
On Dec 3, 11:46 am, randall g wrote:
On Sun, 2 Dec 2007 12:49:09 -0800 (PST), Jay Honeck
wrote:

This is a perfect example. Upon closer examination, the McDonalds case
does have merit. But people don't examine it more closely, because of
their jaundiced eye.
I've heard you say this before, Jose, but never understood it. In
your opinion, what merit was there in a woman winning a lawsuit
against McDonalds because she burned herself on hot coffee?
The woman was seriously injured and spent 8 days in hospital getting
skin grafts. That McD's had been selling super hot coffee for some time
and had previous warnings. This case did have merit and I believe the
woman did not get rich from it either.

randall g =%^) PPASEL+Night 1974 Cardinal RGhttp://www.telemark.net/randallg
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This was a fun case to study in law class. It was a classic example of
how to perfectly lose a case. There is nothing McD's could have done
better to lose that case. When the lady first got hurt, she wrote a
letter to McD's explaining what happened and asking for her medical
bills to be covered. McD's corporate office wrote back a very, very
nasty letter to her telling her "duh coffee is hot" and expressing
*NO* sympathy. If they had said "Sorry you were hurt, its not our
policy to pay for damages you incurred" or even just ignored her that
would be the end of it.
The lady then showed the nasty letter to her neighbor who showed it to
her attorney son. Her son took up the case soley based on the letter
McD's set back.
So the case goes to trial and they interview the McD's manager. The
attorney had just finished showing the jury images of the deformed
lady's "areas" and had just had shown all the surgeries the woman had
had to repair her damage. The McD's manager got up there and told the
jury "Sorry, coffee is not, get over it". Many scholars believe if he
had said "Damn that looks bad, I feel sorry for her, but our coffee is
hot", then the jury would have found in favor of McD's. In addition
the temp of the coffee was hotter than McD's policy.
-Robert

This is an interesting summation.

Unless I'm reading this incorrectly, what you are saying here is that
the outcome of this trial can be directly laid at the feet of an
ill-advised reply by a single individual and a jury's interpretation of
this reply.

So the ACTUAL verdict wasn't based on any reasonable conception of
justice at all but rather the jury's reaction to the MacDonald's reply?

Interesting!! So the lawyer's success in litigating this case was not in
proving to the jury that this woman had suffered legitimate severe
damage that had truly hurt her and on THAT basis asking the jury to find
against MacDonald's, but rather it would seem the lawyers used her
damage simply as a tool to force the jury to compare the coldness of the
MacDonald's replies, thus building a case against MacDonalds in the
minds of the jury based on the attitude of the company rather than the
damage to the woman.
Interesting!
You just gotta love the "justice system" :-))

A wise man once said "In the United States justice system, you get just
about all the justice you can afford"



--
Dudley Henriques