Would you like some fries with that lawsuit???

Time once again to review the winners of the Annual "Stella Awards".
The Stella Awards are named after 81 year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot
coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonald's (in NM). That case
inspired the Stella Awards for the most frivolous, ridiculous, successful lawsuits in the United States.

Here are this year's winners:

5th Place (tie):
Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded
$80,000. 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 toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.

5th Place (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. 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.

5th Place (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 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 $500,000.

4th Place:
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
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 had
climbed over the fence into the yard and 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 and
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, 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 finally .......

1st Place:
This year's runaway winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski of
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mrs. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot
Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home, (from an OU football
game), having driven onto the freeway, she set the cruise control at 70
mph and calmly left the driver's seat to go into the back & make herself
a sandwich. Not surprisingly, 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.
*side note* The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons around


Jackassery at it's finest.
Happy Monday!