The Whole Liability Thing

[skeptic]

Say it again!!!!!!!!

[Eagle92]

part of the problem is that folks today don't get the chance to screw up and take responsibly b/c mommy and daddy are there to get them out of a bind. If you are doing poorly in school, the parents blame the teachers. and I can go on.

[Twocubdad]

I gotta cut Sasha a little slack. It's not as if she would walk down the sidewalk and randomly pick someone to sue. There has to be at least some underlying liability. And despite what you may think, you'll be hard-pressed to find an attorney who would take a case with no basis in fact purely for a shakedown. Too great a chance of working for free.

 

I think many of us are old-school enough that if someone rear-ends us at a light and our injuries are minor and insurance covers our losses, we'll let it go. Assuming the accident was truely an accident we're not going to sure for pain and suffering and all the mumbo-jumbo you see on TV. Just from a philosophical standpoint, we're not going to contribute to the problems of the legal system by going after every last dime.

 

But if it's your child who is injured and facing a lifetime of medical bills, I, too, would be hard-pressed to stand on some notion that we need to single-handedly fix the legal system.

 

By the way, regarding the McDonald's coffee case, I remember hearing interviews with the jurors in which they said the attorneys for McDonald's were all a bunch of condescending jerks. They treated the whole process as if it was beneath them. The jurors said they knew the woman's case was weak, but by the end of the trial the were so fed up with the McDonald's lawyers they found for the woman just to stick it to the lawyers. You can look upon that as it's own version of tort reform, too.

[clemlaw]

As others have pointed out, the McDonald's coffee case is a poor example if you want to show how the tort system has run amok.

 

I don't recall the exact facts of the case, but the coffee that was served was too hot to drink, and it caused severe injury to the woman.

 

I once had coffee spilled on my lap due to the gross negligence and reckless conduct of Northwest Airlines. (And the little brat in the seat in front of me who kept rocking his seat back and forth which caused it to spill.)

 

But I didn't sue Northwest Airlines, and I didn't sue the little monster in the seat in front of me (the poster child for umbrella policies). The reason I didn't sue them is because Northwest Airlines apparently figured out that if you serve coffee on a moving airplane, there is a good chance that eventually, some coffee will get spilled. Therefore, they served it at a temperature that was hot enough to drink, but not enough to give people third degree burns in the genitals if it happens to land there.

 

If you hand coffee out the window to people in a vehicle that's going to be moving, it's reasonable to expect that some of that coffee will wind up on top of someone's genitals. So it's not unreasonable to me that if you hand them near boiling liquid, you can expect to be sued when it gets spilled.

 

In my case, since the coffee wasn't dangerously hot, no harm was done. If I weren't the good-natured person that I am, maybe I would have stormed up to the gate agent after the flight and demanded that they pay my dry cleaning bill. But since I was wearing jeans, I couldn't really even do that. I suppose I endured a small amount of embarassment as I walked through the airport looking like I had wet my own pants, but I probably couldn't have sued successfully for that trivial embarassment.

 

But if I had gotten third-degree burns to my genitals, you can bet that I would have sued them into bankruptcy. But that's not what happened. It didn't happen because someone had enough sense to realize that it's not a good idea to hand cups of boiling liquid to people in a moving vehicle.

[evmori]

She won because McDonald's was serving their coffee at a temperature of 185 degrees, a temperature that produces 3rd degree burns almost instantly, is higher than other restaurants commonly serve their coffee, and was known by McDonald's to be a safety hazard as evidenced by the plethora of complaints they had already received about their dangerously hot coffee. And she was found to be 20% at fault, so it isn't as though the court didn't take her participation into account. But in other words, it wasn't an accident.

 

And ya wanna bet she knew this?

 

20% responsible? Did McDonald's tell her to put the cup in her lap?

 

This is so sad that personal responsibility has taken a back set to "Who can I blame".

[packsaddle]

I will defend Sasha. I don't know the full details of that event but the drunk driver who crossed the centerline and nearly killed my entire family on their way to school in the morning: had BAC of 0.35%, was on Xanax (not prescribed), was traveling at high speed, had sideswiped a bus a few hundred meters back down the road, did not own the vehicle, vehicle had the minimum insurance, the insurance company knew he was a drunk because a couple of weeks beforehand he had a minor one-car collision involving DUI, they did nothing about that one, while on the other hand:

my family was obeying the speed limit and was at no fault whatsoever.

When the insurance company met with us, it was because I had notified them of the wreck - it was the first notification they had received. They informed us of the coverage limit and low-balled us at that, tried to get our signatures. The ACTUAL medical and other expenses (not including the vehicle) came to over $100K and were about 8 times the coverage. Our own insurance company covered us through under-insured coverage BUT after our first meeting with them, I wised up and got an attorney. I had had enough of people paying more attention to getting our signature than to trying to do the right thing. In the end, the coverage was adequate. There was no 'profit' to us. My wife is permanently impaired. Daughter still hurts 10 years later. Three years later, we settled out of court.

The drunk never saw a day of jailtime. Paid his $200 fine and went to flight school in Oklahoma. His mother bought him another vehicle. If there had been a way to legally reach out and 'touch' him, I would have.

 

Before any of you criticize Sasha or people in similar situations, I advise you to walk a mile in those shoes. It is a different perspective on things. In the future, after dealing with our event, if anything similar happens to me or my family again, one of my first calls will be to my attorney. We narrowly escaped making a huge mistake before...a lesson learned the hard way, and never forgotten.

 

[Eagle007]

Packsaddle, when I look at it from that point of view it gives me a whole new perspective. My hat's off to you for shedding new light.

 

It is unfortunate, though, that there are people in this world whom I have responded to with the ambulance in car collisions that the first thing they yell is "I'm gonna sue, I'm gonna sue!" The collision was witnessed by multiple people all saying, including the person struck, that it was a bump (stopped car where the driver slipped off of the brake pedal) from behind. Everyone was in seatbelts with no vehicles damaged. When we arrive on scene the party immediately falls out of the car holding their necks going into a seizure trying to get the devil out. They are treated like any other person involved in a collision and immobilized to the fullest, assessed and taken to the ER for evaluation and treatment. And everyone's auto insurance premiums continue to rise.

[perdidochas]

In terms of McDonald's, they serve coffee hotter, because that is what their customer base wanted. I knew many people previous to the lawsuit that chose McDonald's coffee because it was still hot when they got to work. I avoided it, personally, because it was too hot (I like my coffee warm, not hot).

 

 

[Beavah]

If you hand coffee out the window to people in a vehicle that's going to be moving, it's reasonable to expect that some of that coffee will wind up on top of someone's genitals.

 

Nah, not sure I buy that, clemlaw.

 

I'm not convinced that it's reasonable to expect someone will stick their coffee between their legs rather than use the cupholder. Heck, by that measure of "reasonableness" givin' them a coffee or food in a moving vehicle when you know it may be a distraction to their driving makes the poor restaurant responsible for any subsequent traffic accident, eh?

 

People liked McDonald's coffee because it was hot, eh? It would stay warm durin' that long commute. Heck, on campin' trips, I always boil water for my coffee or hot chocolate, so I'm servin' it even hotter than McD's! Yikes. Better go get the warnin' labels! One of you fellow scouters might sue me if yeh dump your coffee down your pants because you're laughin' so hard around da campfire (our campfires are always fun, eh!). I wonder if that means our campfire needs a waiver, too?

 

I get really annoyed these days by chain restaurants that refuse to serve me a rare or medium-rare burger or cut of beef, eh? That's what I want as a customer. Darn it, I think I have the right to make a purchase contract with a restaurant to get food served the way I want it. I know the risks.

 

Car companies make cars that can drive above the speed limit on da highway. So does that make 'em responsible for every accident to a speeding motorist?

 

Where does it end? These days yeh have to have warning labels on ladders. Do we get to the point where no ladder can have a top two steps because despite the warnin' label, some nitwit will stand on the top step while trying to install a 150 lb air conditioning unit above a concrete driveway? That's certainly possible, eh? But is it reasonable?

 

Beavah

(This message has been edited by Beavah)

[evmori]

f you hand coffee out the window to people in a vehicle that's going to be moving, it's reasonable to expect that some of that coffee will wind up on top of someone's genitals.

 

Nah, not sure I buy that, clemlaw.

 

I do. Especially if they stick that cup between their legs and drive away!

[clemlaw]

>>>>>>One of you fellow scouters might sue me if yeh dump your coffee down your pants because you're laughin' so hard around da campfire

[J-Stroke]

I logged on today to get some info on TLT but, as an attorney, was drawn to this thread. And of course, as an attorney, I have to put my 2 cents in.

 

First, as to the McDonld's case (and many others like it), my response has always been that the "broken legal system" did not award that woman any money; you did. Maybe not you personally but someone just like you. A citizen ... a neighbor ... a peer; in other words ... a juror. Somehow the plaintiff and her lawyers convinced a group of regular folk to make McDonalds give her money. The fact is we weren't there. We don't know exactly what they heard. We don't know all the evidence.

 

Second, addressing the subject that started this thread, here's a real life scouter situation for your consideration. I recently took a group of scouts to Boundary Waters for an 8 day wilderness canoe trek. The boys who wanted to go had about a year and a half to get in shape. Nevertheless, one boy was 15 pounds over the BSA's height/weight maximum allowable weight when the time came for me to make the final determination of who was going. I called a meeting with the boy, his mom and our scoutmaster and said he couldn't go. Long story short, after much crying and debating, mom and scoutmaster convinced me to let the boy go.

 

The morning of Day 3, on the second leg of a 1/2 mile portage, the scout didn't emerge. I backtracked to find him collapsed unconscious on the portage trail. Again, long story short, it turned out not to be fatal and we continued on our trek. Of course, the rest of the trek the other scouts had to portage his packs and his canoe but that's another story.

 

So, assume the scout had died. I'm the adult leader in charge; I'm the one trained in CPR, Wilderness First Aid, Paddlecraft Safety, etc., etc. And I'm the one who signed the National Tour Permit avowing that I had all the Health Forms which were in order. What would you do if you were the scout's mom? Or, what if you were the scout's dad who had joint legal custody? Also, if I did get sued do you think I would or would not be covered by the BSA's liability insurance?

 

 

[Eagle007]

J-Stroke, to answer your last question, if I were on the jury and were going strictly by what BSA national published in the height/weight requirements, I would have to find for the plaintiff.

 

Since I do have a son by an ex-wife who is in scouts and I lost him due to your scenario, I'm really unsure what I'd do. If it were my son in that role, I'm finding it hard to believe (unless proven otherwise) that just 15 extra pounds of ground round in and of itself would cause him to collapse without underlying issues that you weren't made aware of.

[Eamonn]

I'm not an attorney.

I don't work and never have worked for an insurance company.

A lot of this stuff is way beyond my understanding.

I think many of us have heard the horror stories about people being sued.

I think for me, that if I were to dwell on this for too long I'd be so worried that I wouldn't bother getting out of bed in the morning.

So what is a working stiff like myself to do?

Not getting out of bed isn't really an option!

All I can do is use my best judgment and take as much care as can be reasonably expected.

Sometimes this does mean having to use tough love and I come off looking like the bad guy.

But the truth is that when I tell someone that they can't do something it is more about my concern for them than anything to do with any sort of liability.

Working in a jail, you can imagine how many "Nuisance" law suits are filed by the inmates. I don't work in that area but it seems to me most never ever seem to go very far.

I've been in Scouting for a very long time and have met a lot of Scouter's. So far other than one real twit who broke just about every rule in the book, tied scouts to a tree and did a weired initiation ceremony for which he ended up in jail for. I have never met a Scouter who has been sued. (The BSA settled this one out of court.)

Eamonn.