Totally OT and long but funny none the less
 

TALK ABOUT CRAZY !!!
________________________________

The "Stella" awards rank up there with the Darwin awards.
Stella Liebeck is the 81 year old lady who spilled coffee
on herself and sued McDonalds. This case inspired an
annual award - The "Stella" Award for the most frivolous
lawsuits in the U.S.

The following are this year's candidates:

1. January 2000: 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
understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the
misbehaving little monster was Ms. Robertson's son.

2. June 1998: A 19 year old Carl Truman of Los Angeles
won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor
ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman
apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel
of the car, when he was trying to steal his neighbor's
hubcaps.

3. October 1998: A 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 couldn't re-enter the
house because the door connecting the house and
garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was
on vacation. Mr.Dickson found himself locked in the
garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of
Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He
sued the homeowner's insurance claiming the situation
caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to
the tune of half a million dollars.

4. October 1999: Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas
was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after
being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's
beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced-
in yard. The award was less than sought because the jury
felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the
time by Mr. Williams who was shooting it repeatedly with
a pellet gun.

5. May 2000: A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay
Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania $113,500 after
she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone).
The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson threw
it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

6. December 1997: Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware
successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring
city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor
and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while
Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the
ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She
was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

And the winner is: Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City.

In November 2000 Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new
32 foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip home,
having joined the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70
mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back and
make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly the Winnie
left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski
sued Winnebago for not advising him in the handbook that
he couldn't actually do this. He was awarded $1,750,000
plus a new Winnie. (Winnebago actually changed their
handbooks on the back of this court case, just in case there
are any other complete morons buying their vehicles.)

Who serves on these Juries? What kind of morons live in this country?

That's why anyone who breaks into my house will not make it out alive, even if I have to drag them back in to finish 'em off.

Doug

That last one is the reason we have ridiculously obvious warnings printed on everything these days.

You just wait - someday 10-cent Bic pens will have 50-cent warning tags on them. If you think I'm kidding, I will remind you that around 100 people a year die in this country by choking on ballpoint pens. Just wait until one of those victims' families sues.

'Cripes! All I want to do is use this friggin' pen! How's this stupid tag come off???'

LOL damm i needed a good laugh,, u can sue for anything i guess these dasy no wonder lawyers haev so much money..

okay make that the 2nd person i hate the most

1st car sales men
2nd lawyers !!!!

I dont know I believe these....

Re: Totally OT and long but funny none the less
 

Sounds about right from a Lancaster native. (PS - I'm allowed to say that, I'm a Lancaster native.)

-Mike :D

I understand your skepticism. But I just received the first 'email issue' of the Stella Awards, and this guy quotes his sources.

The winner's story has been around
 

for years. I remember hearing it when I was a kid with hair. Smells fishy to me.

Todd

Good grief....(by the way, IS there such a thing?)
 

I agree with you Doug. If any of those are true, and the juries are made up of our friends and neighbors, well.....to quote REM, "it's the end of the world as we know it!" :( Don

Re: Good grief....(by the way, IS there such a thing?)
 

Yup... The enemy are us.

Ron.

Stellas
 

For those of you who may not believe those, let me tell you
of one I know is true, because it happened to a friend of
mine. He's in the business of making automatic tying machines.
All his machines have guards installed in accordance with OSHA
and other fed and state regs to prevent operator injuries.
One day, he got a call from a lawyer in NJ who told him that
he represented an operator of one of these machines, who was
filing suit for loss of a finger.
Curious as to how this could have happened, my friend went
down and looked at the machine, and found that all the guards
had been cut off or otherwise removed. This didn't faze the
jury who awarded the moron (and the idiots who allowed
the machine to be run this way) $1/2million.
Dan

along the same lines
 

In the Bronx New york a man is suing McDonald's
Burger King and other fast food places for not warning him that the food would make him --get this--drum roll please--
F A T and U N H E A L T H Y!!!!!
this is not a lie anybody can look it up in any ny newspaper archive if you don't believe me...
the decision has not been rendered yet but I swear cr@p like this makes me so upset that people are willing to do this for $$$$..
what cojones...

I am going to sue the FHI/SOA for the followings:

a: Pain and emotional sufferings caused by my SVX while it was in shop

b: pain and emotional sufferings caused by the SVX at night because I love the car so much and I can't have it in my house while I sleep.

What do you think?

-- L :D

Re: along the same lines
 

Yeah, that one is actually true. The guy's been all over the news.

I may be off on the facts a little, but I seem to remember that he claims to have eaten fast food since the 50s without any inkling that it was bad for him.

Uh...sure, dood. Whatever.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/786102.asp

The poll on the page, while unscientific, does suggest that the 'court of public opinion' doesn't exactly agree with him.

Sounds like you have a good case on your hands! (much better than some of the other stories in this thread). Don't forget all the undue stress wondering if our tranny will hold together long enough for us to get to our destinations.