During the trial it was revealed that McDonald’s knew that heating their coffee to this temperature would be dangerous, but they did it anyways because it would save them money. When you serve coffee that is too hot to drink, it will take much longer for a person to drink their coffee, which means that McDonald’s will not have to give out as many free refills of coffee. This policy by the fast food chain is the reason the jury awarded $2.7 million dollars in punitive damages in the McDonald’s hot coffee case. Punitive damages are meant to punish the defendant for their inappropriate business practice.
They had also been warned several times previously to stop doing it.
When you dive into that case, you definitely side with the lady. She had some pretty serious burns, like way beyond what most of us would get if we spilled coffee that we made at the house.
If my memory serves me well, she originally only asked them to cover the medical expenses. So their greed ended up costing them far more.
The woman’s scalds were almost enough to kill her. She spent weeks in hospital and needed skin grafts. To make it worse, McDonald’s had received multiple complaints about the temperature of their coffee.
Her lawsuit was just to help cover the medical expenses. McDonald’s didn’t want a precedence of being sued so their PR cooked up a narrative of greedy frivolous lawsuits and America bought this story hook line and sinker.
but yet people will still dismiss it as a stupid lawsuit by some greedy woman. gotta protect those big corps
Both can be true.
She didn’t seek out that much money. She only wanted money to cover her medical costs. If you feel upset about the amount then you should blame the jury. They’re the ones who came up with the amount. (Which the judge lowered.)
It’s not about the money. Its about her being as dumb and as irresponsible as mcds.
How was she dumb? How was she irresponsible?
Gee I spilled hot coffee in my lap…let me just do nothing and sit in it.
Ur labia don’t get fused cuz coffee gets splashed on them.
