Stella Awards

[Sage]

Just in case you have any ideas of making extra money... It's time once again to consider the candidates for the annual Stella Awards. The Stellas are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffeeon herself and successfully sued McDonalds. That case inspired the StellaAwards for the most frivolous successful lawsuits in the United States. The following are this year's candidates:

1. 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 toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.

2. 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 hub caps.

3. 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 thehomeowner's insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

4. 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 was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

5. 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.

6. 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.

7. This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago
motor home. On his first trip home, having driven onto 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 R.V. left thefreeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not
advising him in the owner's manual that he couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually
changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.

[jfrano]

What's the source of these?!? That #7 is something. Sometimes I hear these or polls and I can't believe the results. Like one I heard last week, forget the actually percentage, was double digit, people couldn't identify where the Pacific Ocean is!!!!!

[Len]

You've been had. None of these occurred.

See http://www.snopes.com/legal/lawsuits.htm

[TheWorm]

The Stella Awards site debunked them too. They'd be good for Maxim's "which headline is fake" quiz, tho, since (sadly) they are believable.

http://www.stellaawards.com/bogus.html

[chiquita]

Thank God they're fake--I was getting furious reading them!!

[Sage]

Originally posted by chiquita
Thank God they're fake--I was getting furious reading them!!

Amen!

[RipRocK]

Originally posted by chiquita
Thank God they're fake--I was getting furious reading them!!

Yeah, me too. What's still sad is that we live in a society which has got to the point where we actually ended up believing the stories unless refuted.

[pre-sage pilot]

Originally posted by RipRocK


Yeah, me too. What's still sad is that we live in a society which has got to the point where we actually ended up believing the stories unless refuted.

Same here I had seen these before and didn"t know wether to believe them or not although i was leaning towards believing it,
which either shows i'm easily duped or as you said it just goes to show where "we" are as a society.