Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Any Americans out there who wish to defend their fellow countrymen?

Since some of my readers doesn´t appreciate my reflections on the American society I figured sucha headline would get them fired up :)

Here are the top 7 people who sued someone for their own stupidity and got away with it.
The list is from last years (2008) Stella Awards (www.stellaawards.com)



#7
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 store owners were understandably surprised by
the verdict, considering the running toddler was her own son.

#6
Carl Truman, 19, of Los Angeles , California won $74,000 plus medical
expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Truman
apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he
was trying to steal his neighbor's hubcaps.

#5
Terrence Dickson, of Bristol , Pennsylvania , who was leaving a house he
had just burglarized by way of the garage. Unfortunately for Dickson, the
automatic garage door opener malfunctioned and he could not get the garage
door to open. Worse, he couldn't re-enter the house because the door
connecting the garage to the house locked when Dickson pulled it shut.
Forced to sit for eight, count 'em, EIGHT days and survive on a case of
Pepsi and a large bag of dry dog food, he sued the homeowner's insurance
company claiming undue mental Anguish. Amazingly, the jury said the
insurance company must pay Dickson $500,000 for his anguish. We should all
have this kind of anguish.

#4
Jerry Williams, of Little Rock, Arkansas, garnered 4th Place in the
Stella's when he was awarded $14,500 plus medical expenses after being
bitten on the butt by his next door neighbor's beagle - even though the
beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. Williams did not get as
much as he asked for because the jury believed the beagle might have been
provoked at the time of the butt bite because Williams had climbed over the
fence into the yard and repeatedly shot the dog with a pellet gun.

#3
Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania because a jury ordered a
Philadelphia restaurant to pay her $113,500 after she slipped on a spilled
soft drink and broke her tail bone. The reason the soft drink was on the
floor: Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during
an argument. What ever happened to people being responsible for their own
actions?

#2
Kara Walton, of Claymont , Delaware sued the owner of a night club in a
nearby city because she fell from the bathroom window to the floor, knocking
out her two front teeth. Even though Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through
the ladies room window to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge, the jury said
the night club had to pay her $12,000....oh, yeah, plus dental expenses. Go
figure.


And the winner is!
Mrs. Merv
Grazinski, of Oklahoma City , Oklahoma , who purchased new 32-foot Winnebago
motor home. On her first trip home, from an OU football game, having driven
on to the freeway, she set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the
driver's seat to go to the back of the Winnebago to make herself a sandwich.
Not surprisingly, the motor home left the freeway, crashed and overturned.
Also not surprisingly, Mrs. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not putting in the
owner's manual that she couldn't actually leave the driver's seat while the
cruise control was set. The Oklahoma jury awarded her, are you sitting down?
$1,750,000 PLUS a new motor home. Winnebago actually changed their manuals
as a result of this suit, just in case Mrs. Grazinski has any relatives who
might also buy a motor home.


Amazing, nothing but amazing.

9 comments:

Kale said...

Keep in mind it was an american who sent you this. Who actually got it from a Canadian. See how I even capitalize Canada but not america! Am I a bad american or just an american who is fed up with the stupidity of the rest of his country?

Pierre Wikberg said...

I´m not down with capitalizing america either, nor god.

I think you are a great american and so are 99% of my american friends (with 1% margin for error).

It´s pretty sad to see a country that´s so divided. It´s almost like 40% of the country hates the other 60%.

Every country has it´s problem, but I can´t find a group in the western world I disagree more with than an american republican who has a lot of money, goes to church and have guns in his house.

Even the most right winged political parties here are right where Obama is.

Anonymous said...

Dude - I am British and we seem to be sliding head first into this blame culture that has been the norm in the states for so long. Whatever happened to people just admitting they f**ked up and moving on with their lives. The f**kers who awarded these pricks their payouts are beyond comprehension.

Pierre Wikberg said...

Good thing there are common sensed judges in the US who decide these things.

Just look at this 57-year-old Administrative Law Judge from Washington DC who got 1st at the Stella Awards in 2007.

http://www.stellaawards.com/2007.html

Karl Truman said...

Shouldn't a great American search for the truth? I can't believe people are out there still quoting these claims as real when they have been proved to be FALSE! Look at http://www.snopes.com/legal/lawsuits.asp and http://www.snopes.com/autos/techno/cruise.asp. I challenge you or anyone to produce the actual court documents to show these cases are real.

If you believe these stories in emails, then I know a Nigerian who has several million dollars who needs help getting his money out of the country and will gladly share it with you for helping him!

gianni said...

yo pierre, if you disagree with AMERICA over than any other country in the west, is it safe to assume you agree with communism in cuba? i am a republican but my father is from italy. i travel to europe all the time an i still think american government is far superior to anything in europe. that isnt to say European countries arent the shit, i actually am moving to london for school. cant we all just see one anther as humans not Americans, or Swedes or, koreans.

gianni said...

yo pierre, if you disagree with AMERICA over than any other country in the west, is it safe to assume you agree with communism in cuba? i am a republican but my father is from italy. i travel to europe all the time an i still think american government is far superior to anything in europe. that isnt to say European countries arent the shit, i actually am moving to london for school. cant we all just see one anther as humans not Americans, or Swedes or, koreans.

Pierre said...

No I don´t agree with communism on Cube, although I must say that it´s pretty awesome than any person there (Cuban or not) would get the appropriate treatment without paying anything if they got hurt or got sick/ill.

I´m very much a capitalist at heart, but that doesn´t mean I like the way America works, hell most of my American friends doesn´t like how it works.

How you can say that the American Government is far superior to anything is Europe is very interesting.
I mean, haven´t the US Senate tied a few times? Seems pretty weird to have an even number in the Senate.
How about the votes in Florida when W Bush won there? You call that a superior government?
A rigged presidential election, in the 21st century. Excellent govt.

Oh and O.J.. yeah that was a great exhibition on how well the American legal system works.
Survival of the richest.

The 40% i pay in taxes in the US are paying for 6 seconds of the war in the Middle East, that´s such a great way to spend my tax money.
Then you have to pay for health insurance, school for the kids, nanny for the kids, I still pay tolls quite often when I drive, oh and a college fund.. What a great govt that first takes almost half of my paycheck and then I still have to pay A LOT to make sure myself and my kids can go to school and get treated if someone in my family breaks an arm on the annual trip to Big Bear every Thanksgiving. Just a superior govt.

I agree, we are all humans. But I find all cultures interesting and since I´ve spent most of my days in Sweden and America I tend to dwell on how similar those two countries are on some levels and then how radically different they are on others.

Every country is obviously different and I´ve enjoyed visiting and living in more than a handful of them and I´ll prolly babble about cultures until I can´t speak anymore.

Peas.

Denver Pierce said...

Just stumbled on this article and its really surprising to believe these judgments are true. As pointed out in some of the comments, the information shared here needs to be fact checked