From the WSJ [subscription only]:
We’ve all heard about the woman who won millions in a lawsuit after spilling hot coffee on herself. But now there’s a new contender for the title of most outrageous jury award. Last week a court in Texas demanded $27.5 million in damages for a woman of Iranian descent who claimed she was racially profiled during an altercation with Southwest Airlines flight attendants.
Samantha Carrington of Santa Barbara, California, alleges that a Southwest Airlines employee said Ms. Carrington reminded her of a “terrorist” during the 2003 incident, which resulted in her detention in El Paso and subsequent arrest. Southwest, meanwhile, accuses Ms. Carrington of assaulting a flight attendant and interfering with the crew.
We can’t know for sure who’s telling the truth here. But we do know that passengers aren’t generally detained for frivolous reasons, and that flight crews need to be able to do their job without fear of frivolous claims. Even if Ms. Carrington was ill-treated, the most she deserved was some free tickets. Only in America could she hit the tort jackpot. What’s next? A profiling suit from Zacarias Moussaoui?
Quips Terry Hastings, who sent along the link:
I wonder if Cynthia McKinney will sue the security officer for racial profiling?
Heh. Don’t be ridiculous, Terry.
That’s what Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are for.
Oh, and about this Southwest thing? Anybody want to take bets that the jury was seated in Austin? Or that jurors were drawn from a ditch community in Crawford…?
The jury believed this complainer over the attendants? Amazing. Attendants are generally at least minimally polite, and rarely actually order a passenger to do something unless the passenger is trying to do something monumentally stupid, like open a door in flight.
I had to go back and reread it. I thought it was just a suit, I didn’t know that the jury and rendered a verdict.
Jaaaaysus! I’m certain that this is going to be appealed. I would like to really see the pleadings.
Dammit! Why can’t I remind some deep pocket of a terrorist? Damn my white Irish skin! Lucky freakin’ Iranian.
We sure do know that.
OK,
1. The victim is from Santa Barbara…not a stretch tho imagine, perhaps the plaintiff has cash, so I’m sorry 27.5 million is just a flippin JOKE
2. Flight attendants are trained to protect passengers NOT just serve tea and coffee and kiss rude passengers asses
3. This suit reminds me of Steven Speilbergs sisters airline suit…yes rich sister of rich director sued airline for scaring her and making think she was going to die because the airline hit severe turbulence and made a sudden drop and I guess the pilot was not lying to the passengers about the predicament, he was you know…taking the situation seriously
4. Lawyers are just fucking up our world, to do nothing noble, but fill their own pockets
This has to be appealed…the damages are just way too excessive
Where do I get my 27.5 million (I’ll take 5). The aircrews take advantage of the tense secutity to not do their jobs.
Our plane waited on the runway for over an hour, the flight attendant was standing in the aisle near a lavatory reading a paperback, I was packed into my seat like a sardine, and the flight attendant declined to give me any water. I was told to shut up or get off the plane!
I wonder if Cynthia McKinney will sue the security officer for racial profiling?
Then I’m suing Jesse Jackson, Al Gore and Bill Clinton.
I am a registered republican and they call me every election to tell me to vote for the Democrats and then repeat in spanish. When I asked my registered Democrat and Union member neighbor if they called him too, he said no, never.
Hmm…odd? No, I have a spanish last name.
Oh, not the poor lady who spilt McDonalds’ coffee b.s. again! She didn’t win millions. I forgot the amount but it wasn’t enough. She had originally asked them to just pay her hospital costs but McDonalds refused. The coffee was so hot it caused the cup to collapse in on itself and spilled scalding hot coffee in her hap and gave her serious burns. The coffee was around 20 degrees hotter than the industry standard and there had been similar burn injuries. McDonald was put on notice about it but did nothing. Really, that lady deserved a lot more.
(Sigh)
El Paso County. Don’t know what stereotypes you have about those folks.
Quite
Where can I get myself racially insulted to the tune of a few million bucks. I’m tired of work.
“Iranian†says it all folks. We had a Muslim older lady who assaulted a Wal-Mart check out clerk, then the security guard who had come to the defense of the clerk and tried to restrain the lady. When the police came she was still hitting every one in sight. But they did finally get her restrained. However being an elderly lady she had actually hurt herself, so Wal-Mart sent her to the hospital. The mayor of our fine city (Greensboro, NC) ran right over to the hospital with flowers and candy and a big abject apology from the city. Not a word to the Wal-Mart employees who were attacked. The lady’s son was yelling about suing until Wal-Mart showed him the film of the whole scene and affidavits from witnesses. Before she could be prosecuted the lady was quickly sent back to where she had come from. As I said, nothing had to be said but “Iranian†to tell the whole tale. I have no idea what is going on with Americans or why we allow some people to act badly just because they are minorities. Aren’t our laws supposed to be for everyone? Why am I becoming a second class citizen in my own country?
You remind me of a character from “12 Angry Men.” Can you guess which one?
No amount of inconvenience or insult merits $275,000,000.
Hint: El Paso County is the heavily-Mexican/American tiny blip of BlueState in Far West Texas. Not to be confused with Austin, the tiny blip of BlueState in Central Texas.
So I am not shocked she hit the Discrimination Jackpot there.
Actually, West Texas, reddest of the red, is well-known by forum-shopping plaintiffs’ lawyers as the best place to get a large tort judgment.
“Ding! You are now free to prove that the court system is a joke.”
Punitive damages have an important function in the tort system, but the size of this award is impossible to justify. If someone would like to try, however, I’m all ears.
I could see a similar judgment from juries in Dallas, Beaumont/Port Arthur and my hometown. We host a number of extraordinarily successful plaintiff lawyers like Joe Jamail and John O’Quinn.
Their incomes are on the level of Exxon CEOs.
This doesn’t even get into the success of Jim Adler, the Tough Smart Lawyer.
Most of the time, when you hear about a case that just seems so absurd you can’t believe it’s true, it’s because it’s not–important facts were left out of the story. The McDonald’s coffee bit is a case in point. The woman may not have deserved a few hundred thousand (the final number was NOT in the millions, but it should have been), but McDonald’s deserved to get nailed for its behavior.
Here, however, she’s alive and has no disfiguring injuries. It’s insane that she was awarded more then a few free tickets and a public apology.
FWIW:
$27.5MM is absolutely retarded. It’s like a jury full of actuses (acti?) sat on the case. The woman was inconvenienced, probably embarrassed, but otherwise wholly unharmed. Perhaps the FAs were indeed out of line, but I bet this gals wasn’t wholly innocent in the matter either. Even bitchy FAs don’t have calm, compliant passengers detained.
spam word = green
How do you do that?
Just reading an article in the KC Star headlined:
Cap on jury awards to stand. Dateline, Rio Grande City, Texas.
Any Texas attorneys want to chime in on this.\?
Steve in Houston,
Ha! Jim Adler! It loses something without the accent. Isn’t he also “the Texas Hammer?”
Because airlines are rich, and rich people use them, and rich people are republicans, and republicans are mean, and mean people suck, and it is okay to fuck the living dogshit out of people who suck.
Got it?
tw: defense-> I really have none.
BrendaBee wrote:
“‘Iranian’ says it all folks….As I said, nothing had to be said but ‘Iranian’ to tell the whole tale.”
Jeff, are you by any chance rich? ‘Cause, I’ve just been racially insulted while innocently reading a site you host. You’ve tacitly endorsed this comment by allowing it to appear here. I demand millions in recompense for my emotional anguish! Any lawyers out there want to help me take Jeff for all he’s worth?
Amen, Howe. As he said the McDonalds lady didn’t spill coffee on herself and get millions for an inconvenience. That coffee was hot enough to collapse the cup it was in and cause third degree burns on that woman’s thighs and nethers the instant it touched her skin. It was literally hot enough to cook food. All she initially asked was that McDonalds cover her medical costs and start serving their coffee at a slightly lower temperature so that it wasn’t actually dangerous to customers and McDonalds told her to go fuck herself. Mcdonalds was totally at fault for her injuries and were incredibly callous when she sought a remedy from them.
It’s bad enough the Journal is using apocryphal out-of-control tort stories to set the mood for that article; they don’t need to start new ones. Detaining a person and wrongfully causing their arrest because of their ethnicity strikes me as a bit more than ill-treatment and worth a hell of a lot more in compensation than “some free tickets.” Saying she was “inconvenienced” seems about as dismissive to me as saying an assault victim experienced rudeness.
I may not be as easy going as some of the rest of you, but if I’m ever jugged of to the clink when I’m innocent of any crime I figure I’d consider it a hell of a lot more than an inconvenience. I’d probably also figure it’d take a hell of a lot more than a few free tickets to make up for the loss of freedom, fear, and humiliation I experienced.
I’ll give it a go, Steve. I’m not saying she deserves that much, but the point of punitive damages is that they’re supposed to actually be punitive to the person or company that harmed you. I’m all ears if anyone cares to explain how awarding a “reasonable” sum like, say $500,000, would be punitive to a company the size of Southwest.
Feb 2005 at 4am, my cow-dogs tree a burglar, in my apartment, on my couch.
I hold off the dogs, get the guy out of the apartment, and then capture him at gunpoint as he tries to flee down the driveway.
The cops come. They take the guy.
On his person they find $600 cash and meth. He’s on probation.
I learn that this guy has served time in state and federal prison. He has been convicted of drug possession, sexual assault, burglary…etc.
July 6, 2005. The guy wants a jury trial. He gets one (The DA informed me that this character has always asked for jury trials and always lost). He is charged with burglary with intent to commit theft and criminal trespass. The trial is one day long. The guy doesn’t even contest the criminal trespass. His story is that he was looking for a hooker named ‘Monique’. He doesn’t produce a single witness to verify his claims that a) his friend dropped him off b) he had called ‘Monique’ and made an appointment.
Since he took the stand in his own defense, the jury hears all about his prior history and what he had in his possession.
The jury was out about an hour. Not guilty on all counts.
The perpetrator was Hispanic. Eleven on the jury were Hispanic.
The judge even commented about the verdict “It’s hard to believe…â€Â
He was jailed for one year on the parole violation. I’m sure he’s out now, living La vida dulce.
LULAC and the American GI Forum are the local racist groups that Corpus has gifted this nation with. They apply Mexican meta-physics (“there are many truthsâ€Â) to every issue that can give them advantage (money). When I have friends visit from out of state they CANNOT BELIEVE the billboards, radio and TV advertising personal injury lawyers do down here.
I am moving the hell out of here in May. As I’ve mentioned moving in casual conversation (no mention of why I’m moving) almost to a man, every white professional (except attorneys), has plans to leave within the next few years.
The culture of corruption that oozes up from Mexico is all-encompassing.
I can imagine what it’s like in California. Barely.
My friends in New York think I’m racist. Except my friends who have actually come down here and observed this place first hand.
TW: shot
Wish the VP had shot a few more…
Opps. I’m in Corpus Christi, Texas
First, SeanH, there was nothing motivating my comment except a sincere feeling of surprise at the size of the award. I’m not generally anti-lawyer or anti-punitive damages. I’m a big fan of strict liability, in fact. So save the smartass tone.
Noted.
I understand the point of punitive damages, and I think she was on excellent ground in seeking them (oppressive and malicious, and all that). The FBI agent’s testimony that he didn’t believe the FAs was probably key. 10 times “compensatories” still seems high to me, even though I’m not a hard-and-fast caps/rules person.
I figure it’ll be reduced on appeal, but in the meantime it will contribute to a sense among many that the tort system is a mechanism for jury-directed corporate charitable giving.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald’s_Corp.
“Liebeck sought to settle with McDonald’s for US$20,000 to cover her medical costs, but the company offered only US$800. When McDonald’s refused to raise its offer, Liebeck filed suit, accusing McDonald’s of “gross negligence” for selling coffee that was “unreasonably dangerous” and “defectively manufactured.”
Hrmm. IMHO, Mcdonald’s should have had to pay the 2.7M in punitive damages and Liebeck should have received the full 200,000 in compensatory damages. The only thing outrageous about this case is the behavior of Micky D’s.
With regard to the McDonald’s lady: who puts a full (paper? styrofoam?) cup of hot coffee between their legs, anyway?
If she’s going to do something stupid like that, how is McDonald’s supposed to stop her? And how are they responsible at all? The only possible step they can take is to make their coffee 98.6 degrees F so it never burns anyone, if they have to anticipate that their customers are going to be complete morons.
DrSteve, my smartass tone was meant to be directed at the article and one or two of the comments before yours. If that bled over onto you, I apologize. I probably should have used another comment to respond to your question.
All I meant to say to you was, yeah, it seems excessive to me when I look at it from the awards side, but when I assume her story is correct it doesn’t seem that extreme as a punishment for a company the size of Southwest.
Good job on expressing your opinion on a case you know nothing about, dumbass.
Wikipedia states:
It took me one minute to look that up. Next time you post, consider spending that one extra minute it takes to not look like a moron. Go and look up the definition of punitive damages as well.
This is obviously in reference to the Iranian lady, not the lady who was burned by the coffee, so your Wikipedia research is incorrect.
Next time you post, consider heeding your own advice.
Completely self-inflicted as a result of stupidity if this is correct. Still not seeing how this is in any way McDonalds’ fault, particularly 80 percent as the Wikipedia article says the court decided.
Jim in KC, I hate ridiculous jury awards more than anyone I know, but Liebeck had a strong case. IIUC, the McD’s in question served their coffee extremely and dangerously hot, and had received numerous complaints about it previous to this incident. Her injuries were severe, disfiguring and painful, and I don’t agree that they were self-inflicted through “stupidity”.
Now let’s get back to the (justified) outrage over the profiling award and stop muddying the waters with an urban legend. I thought our side was above “fake but accurate”. =)
The problem is that ten or so years ago the trial lawyers managed to obliterate the rules that civil cases had to be tried in or about the locales in which the alleged offense occurred. Now they forum shop. Have an asbestos case? Go to Beaumont. Have an intellectual property/patent case? Go to Marshall. Mississippi’s got several places that specialize in certain types of cases as well.
Trial Lawyers have abused the nations good graces and need to be put in their place with the following:
1. Eliminate class-action: get named plaintiffs only that participate in the case.
2. Re-establish rules that determine where civil suits can be tried.
3. Loser pays, with judges having the authority to mitigate if they so choose.
yours/
peter
“I’m not saying she deserves that much, but the point of punitive damages is that they’re supposed to actually be punitive to the person or company that harmed you. I’m all ears if anyone cares to explain how awarding a “reasonable†sum like, say $500,000, would be punitive to a company the size of Southwest.”
So, upon the successful conclusion of my current willful pollution lawsuit against Chevron for damages to my property which will cost $20,000,000 or more to remediate, I should expect to receive a damage award which is ‘punitive’ to Chevron? A nice thought, but not very likely.
But, just in case. …. Anybody got a third world country for sale? I’ll pay market for it.
Charlie!
Will you adopt me?
xxx,
peter.
I’m not surprised that someone would set up this sleezy lawsuit nor that some sleezy lawyer would take or help set up the lawsuit. I’m am constantly amazed at how easy it is to find 12 mental retards to sit on a jury. Talk about putting the entire country at risk, just letting these fools walk the street makes me shutter.
Her injuries, “severe and disfiguring” though they may have been, were completely self-inflicted.
Count up her mistakes:
1. Put the cup between her knees. Fast-food joint cups are flimsy, whether we’re talking hot or cold beverages.
2. Pulled the lid off toward her. Two-in-one on this one: first, the lid helps stiffen the flimsy cup; second, pulling it toward her ensures that if it tips it’ll tip into her lap.
3. Putting cream and sugar in her coffee in the first damn place; everyone knows it’s best when drunk black.
No hard feelings, I hope, but I’m having a hard time seeing how anyone can look at this award as justified in any way when the actions that put the coffee (no matter its temperature–that’s a classic red herring, a complete irrelevancy) in her lap are all hers. So we’ll just have to disagree, it appears.
As far as the SWA case goes, I can’t completely make sense out of it with the info I can find. $27.5 million seems awfully high, though.
Completely, except for cooking that coffee that hot.
SeanH’s comment, “…doesn’t seem that extreme as a punishment for a company the size of Southwest.” is at the core of the problem. The deeper the pockets, the greater the expectation of a larger award – so go ahead and “Super-size it”!
Just like excessive amounts of junk food, Americans seem to be addicted to excessive tort jackpots. We all pay the price for higher medical costs, increased insurance premiums, etc.
We’ve seen legal actions against gun manufacturers and we’ve no end to warning labels that caution against sticking screwdrivers in one’s own eye or ironing clothes while wearing them. When will we see warning lables on idiots and unscrupulous lawyers????