Smartassery

Now, usually I’m all for leaving a “stink bomb” on a corporation’s doorstep. On general principle. If I don’t know what they have done wrong, they sure as hell, do. But this trend of frivolous lawsuits against businesses has to stop. 

Enter 79 year old Stella Liebeck who, in 1992, successfully sued McDonald’s for serving hot coffee, which she promptly spilled on her lap causing her to redevelop her thighs landscape and rendering her non-working crotch useless. The jury (composed of 12 fruitflies with ADHD) awarded her $2.9 million on the basis of…of…well, just on the basis.

Now grandma has spawned a trend of cockamamie legal proceedings that should really be aimed at human stupidity but instead, and in classic American fashion, are aimed at someone else with the help of some very greedy lawyers. Heck, they even have their own awards, pressumably without the fancy dresses. Here are this year’s winners: 

5. (tie): Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $80,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle when she tripped over an unruly toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The little devil was her own son. (My ruling would have been to execute her son so she can’t trip over him anymore.)

5. (tie): 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, just as weasel Truman was trying to steal the neighbor’s hubcaps. (On this one, I would rule to cut both hands for stealing and put his balls on parole for having the audacity to sue the victim.)

5. (tie): 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, and Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eightdays. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi 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 $500,000. (I would rule to force feed this asshole with dog food and syrup for the rest of eternity.) 

4. Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his neighbor’s beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner’s fenced yard. Asshole Williams had climbed over the fence into the yard and was shooting at it repeatedly with a pellet gun. (I wish he would’ve climbed into my neighbor’s yard; the one with the vicious German shepperd. The end.) 

3. A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her tailbone. The beverage was on the floor because she had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument. (This one gets an inflatable head. Oh wait, she already has one of those.)

2. Kara Walto 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 she was trying to sneak in through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses. (I would’ve awarded her a bucket of suck-it-up.) 

1. Mrs. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma who purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home, having driven onto the freeway, she set the cruise control at 70mph and calmly left the driver seat to go into the back to make herself a manwich. Not urprisingly, the RV left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mrs.Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising her in the owner’s manual that she couldn’t actually do this. The jury awarded her $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. (This moron with all her regressive genes should’ve gotten a bucket of common sense and public flagelation at the city’s plaza for an entire week.) 

In my next life, I want to be a judge so I can kick some ass and have ooddles of fun making stupid people cry. While I get to that, I think I should move to one of these towns where obviously the lawyers are truly working for the people.

P.S. Thanks to Troy, who’s a star (not only because he thinks that the Beatles-that overhyped, talentless bunch of fags-suck ass, as do I), for collaborating on this post. 

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 7th, 2006 at 3:14 am and is filed under odds and ends, rants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.