Just got this from a friend in an email:
(they are probably true... 
)
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 coffee on herself and successfully sued
McDonald's. That
case
inspired the Stella Awards for the most
frivolous, yet 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. 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
the
homeowner'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 RV left the freeway, 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.
I'm sorry!
