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Previous Stupid Lawsuits
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Robert and Carolyn Wells sued retailer JC Penny, seeking $600,000 in damages for injuries. Mrs. Wells claimed that while shopping during the store’s after-Christmas sale, she was attacked by another customer during an argument over two crystal bear figurines. Wells alleges she was verbally assaulted by the women who also wanted to buy the figurines.
Wells alleged that JC Penny should have protected her from the other shopper and sought damages for injuries to her shoulder, back and neck.
Her husband also sued, claiming loss of her earnings, society, service, company and consortium.
The Tennessee Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s ruling dismissing the suit, saying it “demonstrates the dangers of the cutthroat arena of after-Christmas bargain shopping" and that the store could not reasonably have foreseen the confrontation.
A retailer has prevailed over a shopper in a lawsuit that a state appeals court judge said "demonstrates the dangers of the cutthroat arena of after-Christmas bargain shopping."
Source: gomemphis.com
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It used to be that baseball was America's favorite pastime, but even the grand old game has succumbed to America's newest "favorite" pastime - lawsuits.
The Chicago Cubs are suing the owners of rooftop businesses that overlook Wrigley Field and sell tickets to watch games, saying the establishments are stealing from the team. The lawsuit, filed against the owners of the 13 rooftop businesses bordering Wrigley Field, charges that these businesses steal the team's product, infringe on its copyright and "unjustly enrich themselves to the tune of millions of dollars each year."
Fans watching Cubs games in seats on roofs across the street from the ivy-covered park are a familiar sight to television viewers around the country. Once those fans were local residents in lawn chairs, a beer in one hand and a bratwurst in the other, but today the rooftops are controlled by business people who charge customers to watch games live or on television.
The two sides sought to negotiate a deal in which the business owners would pay the Cubs in return for a bleachers-expansion design that would not block the view of their customers. But the bargaining came to an end and the parties are now in court.
Cubs president and CEO Andy MacPhail said it's unfair for the operators to make millions of dollars a year without giving something back to the team.
MacPhail estimated that the owners gross $8 million to $10 million annually. "They do nothing to contribute to our efforts to put a winning team on the field," MacPhail said. "The free ride is over."
Except, of course, for the lawyers.
Sources: Knight Ridder News Service, AP, December 18, 2002.
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Stupid Lawsuit:
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Meredith Berkman, seeking $50 million, filed one of the first anti-fat lawsuits against the manufacturer of a snack food named Pirate's Booty. It looks like eating too much Pirate's Booty had added too much booty to Ms. Berkman's booty.
In December, 2001, the Good Housekeeping Institute tested Pirate's Booty, which is basically flavored puffed rice, and found that it contained 147 calories and 8.5 grams of fat, while its label said it contained only 120 calories and 2.5 grams of fat.
The manufacturer, Robert's American Gourmet Foods (a subsidiary of Keystone Foods), blamed the problem on a change in its manufacturing process and immediately recalled the product from store shelves.
Nearly four months after the recall, Berkman filed a $50 million class-action lawsuit against Robert's Foods, claiming "emotional distress" and "weight gain...mental anguish, outrage and indignation." The complaint claims to represent all consumers who ruined their diets and had to spend more time at the gym because they ate mislabeled Pirate's Booty.
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Stupid Lawsuit:
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"Not for the weak-kneed," reads the label on the bottle of hot sauce. "Guaranteed to assault your taste buds. It's a lead-pipe cinch you'll love it."
John Farmer and his PDX Hot Lix company brought out the Tonya Hot Sauce a couple of years ago and says it's all in fun.
Tonya Hot Sauce features an unflattering caricature of the disgraced figure skater Tonya Harding outside a dumpy trailer, cigarette in mouth, ice skates in one hand and a hubcap in the other.
Not so says a lawyer representing Harding. Harding's San Diego attorney said the spoof defames Harding and unfairly conjures up memories of what he says are disturbing and misunderstood events that foiled her dreams of an Olympic championship. Made in Oregon, stores pulled the product from the shelves after getting a legal letter advising them not sell the sauce.
The letter threatens a lawsuit for misappropriating Harding's image. "Tonya has been punished more than enough for what she did or didn't do," Harding's lawyer said.
The five-ounce bottles are still available at a few stores for about $5. Farmer says he'll supply them to any retailer who will have them until, or unless, Harding sues.
"I have an attorney who basically thinks the whole thing is laughable" said Farmer. "It's like editorial cartoons we see every day throughout the country."
Harding, a two-time U.S. figure-skating champion, was convicted in 1994 of hindering prosecution in a plot to injure rival Nancy Kerrigan during the U.S. Championships in Detroit. Harding also was banned for life by the U.S. Figure Skating Association.
Last April, she was arrested for drunken driving. While on probation for whacking her then-boyfriend with a hubcap. A condition of probation was that she not drink.
"I've sold maybe 2,000-2,500 bottles," Farmer said. "When she does something really stupid, I sell extra cases of it."
He said he hasn't talked to Harding, but Harding's lawyer said in his letter that Harding would go along with it all if she got "a reasonable share of the revenues."
"She's not going to get much out of me," Farmer said. "If I have to give a percentage to her I demand she give it to MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving)."
Source: Associated Press, November 1, 2002.
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You've heard the stories where some poor schlub plays Dungeons and Dragons for weeks on end, then freaking out and imagining himself to be in a D&D adventure, before he was finally committed to a mental institution. Nobody sued TSR, Inc., publisher of the D&D manuals -- don't ask me how I know that. I just do, okay?! -- because their kid didn't have a firm grip on reality. Nobody sued the friends of the whacko for criminal negligence just because their game-playing somehow caused his mental breakdown.
So why is a Louisiana woman suing Nintendo of America after her son had a deadly seizure? According to a story in the Baton Rouge (Louisiana) Advocate, Esther Walker of Livingston Parish is suing Nintendo, claiming that her son Benjamin Walker, 30, suffered a seizure that caused his death, because he played on his Nintendo 64 game system eight hours a day, six days a week, since he bought it. Walker purchased his Nintendo 64 in May 1999, and then bought 10 more games in the weeks that followed.
According to Esther Walker's lawsuit, "Benji" Walker had six seizures as a result of the game. The sixth one happened on January 22, 2001. According to the lawsuit, ". . . Benjamin passed out, fell forward and hit his head and mouth on a table, which caused a severe closed head injury, loss of teeth, and moderate bleeding." Walker died in the hospital on January 26th, 2001.
The lawsuit also says that Walker had his first seizure in September 1999, and had five subsequent seizures over the next 17 months while playing the games. Esther Walker claims that Nintendo produced a defective product, but failed to give any adequate warnings about the health risks.
What should they have said? "WARNING: TABLES ARE HARD. DO NOT HIT YOUR HEAD ON THEM."
Or how about this: "WARNING: IF YOU SUFFER A SEIZURE AFTER PLAYING OUR GAME FOR 48 HOURS PER WEEK, MAYBE YOU SHOULD CUT BACK A LITTLE BIT, AND OH I DON'T KNOW, TAKE A WALK OUTSIDE OR SOMETHING? I MEAN, COME ON, YOU'RE PLAYING THE GAME LONGER THAN A REGULAR FULL-TIME JOB!"
The company has understandably denied any wrongdoing. And why shouldn't they? They're not like the tobacco companies who purposely made cigarettes addictive and then lied to the world about it for more than 60 years. Nintendo makes games for people to play. What is there to warn about? "WARNING: THERE IS A TENUOUS, NOT-YET-PROVEN LINK BETWEEN CERTAIN ELECTRONIC VIDEO IMAGES AND SEIZURES. SO DON'T PLAY THIS GAME. DON'T EVEN BUY IT. SURE, WE MAY GO OUT OF BUSINESS, BUT THAT'S OKAY. DON'T WORRY ABOUT US. WE'LL MANAGE SOMEHOW. WE CAN STAY WITH FRIENDS."
As sorry as I am for her loss, I can't believe that Esther Walker is somehow surprised by all of this. Let's look at her own statements. Benjamin Walker played his Nintendo 64 for eight hours a day, six days a week, for seventeen months! Of course the guy had seizures! Anybody who does something that much is bound to have some sort of problem. Whether it's morbid obesity owing to lack of exercise, an exploded bladder, or severe social awkwardness, if you sit in front of a TV for 48 hours per week, something will go wrong.
I can't even work for eight hours a day, let alone all in a row. I usually spend two or three hours a day playing computer games or cruising the 'Net for pictures of Pamela Anderson (Note: if my boss is reading this, that last sentence is completely untrue. I only put it in there for comedic effect. I actually work 40 hours a week, non-stop. Did I say 40? I meant 60 hours a week.).
But what makes it worse is that Benjamin Walker continued to play even after he suffered his first seizure four months after he bought the game. Not only that, he continued on his eight-hours-a-day-six-days-a-week playing schedule, racking up another four seizures. The fifth one happened while he was playing again, and it just happened to be the one that did him in.
Doesn't it m
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