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> At worst McDonald's was probably like 10% responsible 80%, according to the jury. > The jury actually did find the woman was partially responsible Correct,

> At worst McDonald's was probably like 10% responsible 80%, according to the jury. > The jury actually did find the woman was partially responsible Correct, which was factored into the award of actual damages, reducing the $200,000 in damages to a $160,000 award, since it was in a comparative negligence jurisdiction. > it was the judge that decided on the absurd damages amount. It later got reduced and settled out of court No, it was the jury that returned the original $2.7 million punitive damage award, which the judge reduced to $480,000, for a total actual+punitive award of $640k in the trial judgement. The parties did settle out of court while an appeal of the trial judgement was pending.

ljsprague 1y ago
It's funny how small $2.7 million sounds to me today. A guy got $50 million from Starbucks recently. https://youtu.be/xSC6qLsLcgU https://youtu.be/xSC6qLsLcgU
Ajedi32 1y ago
I see, so it was the jury that was responsible for the ridiculous ruling, not the judge. My mistake, I misread. Definitely seems like there were some systemic or possibly cultural issues at play here.
- dragonwriter 1y ago
  > I see, so it was the jury that was responsible for the ridiculous ruling, not the judge No, a jury verdict that is not reflected in the trial judgement is not a ruling at all. There was some rush-to-publish reporting of the jury verdict prior to the ruling which is the source of the whole popular perception of the case, because the misunderstanding of the case has deliberately magnified ao it can be weaponized by people wanting to limit perfectly warranted recovery from actually-at-fault corporatiojs by spinning false tales of out-of-control judgements.
  - Ajedi32 1y ago
    That's a fair criticism of the media headlines, but the final ruling of $480,000 just in punitive damages ($1M inflation-adjusted) is still pretty ridiculous given, again, that handling too-hot-to-immediately-drink beverages is a normal, reasonable risk that almost everyone encounters as part of everyday life. We could quibble about about the compensatory damages (80% McDonald's fault seems too high to me, but it's also probably not 0%), but I feel that certainly there should be no punitive damages for such things.
    - dragonwriter 1y ago
      > That's a fair criticism of the media headlines, but the final ruling of $480,000 just in punitive damages ($1M inflation-adjusted) is still pretty ridiculous Given subsequent McDonald's incidents of the same type, it was clearly inadequate to serve the function of punitive damages, that is, to be sufficient to dissuade the willful tortfeasor from repeating the same willful tort. (It’s quite likely that the original $2.7 million award would also have been.) > handling too-hot-to-immediately-drink beverages is a normal, reasonable risk that almost everyone encounters as part of everyday life. That's not an argument that the punitive damage award was ridiculous, that's an argument that the jury assessment of comparative negligence that figured into the actual damage award was wrong. Punitive damages are not even in theory about the degree of care that the injured party should have applied, that's the comparative negligence part of actual damages.
      - Ajedi32 1y ago
        My point is I don't think McDonalds needs to be legally dissuaded from serving hot coffee in the first place, certainly not by a court with no law making powers. The minutia of the legal statues aren't relevant to my argument. I'm open to the idea of awarding damages for harms caused by inherently risky activities as a way of incentivizing companies to take extra steps beyond what is legally or morally necessary to mitigate those risks, but in such cases the damages should be compensatory, not punitive, and use a comparative negligence-like standard based on the degree to which the risks could have been realistically mitigated and the degree to which the plaintiffs are themselves personally responsible.

ljsprague 1y ago

It's funny how small $2.7 million sounds to me today. A guy got $50 million from Starbucks recently. https://youtu.be/xSC6qLsLcgU https://youtu.be/xSC6qLsLcgU

Ajedi32 1y ago

I see, so it was the jury that was responsible for the ridiculous ruling, not the judge. My mistake, I misread. Definitely seems like there were some systemic or possibly cultural issues at play here.

dragonwriter 1y ago
> I see, so it was the jury that was responsible for the ridiculous ruling, not the judge No, a jury verdict that is not reflected in the trial judgement is not a ruling at all. There was some rush-to-publish reporting of the jury verdict prior to the ruling which is the source of the whole popular perception of the case, because the misunderstanding of the case has deliberately magnified ao it can be weaponized by people wanting to limit perfectly warranted recovery from actually-at-fault corporatiojs by spinning false tales of out-of-control judgements.
- Ajedi32 1y ago
  That's a fair criticism of the media headlines, but the final ruling of $480,000 just in punitive damages ($1M inflation-adjusted) is still pretty ridiculous given, again, that handling too-hot-to-immediately-drink beverages is a normal, reasonable risk that almost everyone encounters as part of everyday life. We could quibble about about the compensatory damages (80% McDonald's fault seems too high to me, but it's also probably not 0%), but I feel that certainly there should be no punitive damages for such things.
  - dragonwriter 1y ago
    > That's a fair criticism of the media headlines, but the final ruling of $480,000 just in punitive damages ($1M inflation-adjusted) is still pretty ridiculous Given subsequent McDonald's incidents of the same type, it was clearly inadequate to serve the function of punitive damages, that is, to be sufficient to dissuade the willful tortfeasor from repeating the same willful tort. (It’s quite likely that the original $2.7 million award would also have been.) > handling too-hot-to-immediately-drink beverages is a normal, reasonable risk that almost everyone encounters as part of everyday life. That's not an argument that the punitive damage award was ridiculous, that's an argument that the jury assessment of comparative negligence that figured into the actual damage award was wrong. Punitive damages are not even in theory about the degree of care that the injured party should have applied, that's the comparative negligence part of actual damages.
    - Ajedi32 1y ago
      My point is I don't think McDonalds needs to be legally dissuaded from serving hot coffee in the first place, certainly not by a court with no law making powers. The minutia of the legal statues aren't relevant to my argument. I'm open to the idea of awarding damages for harms caused by inherently risky activities as a way of incentivizing companies to take extra steps beyond what is legally or morally necessary to mitigate those risks, but in such cases the damages should be compensatory, not punitive, and use a comparative negligence-like standard based on the degree to which the risks could have been realistically mitigated and the degree to which the plaintiffs are themselves personally responsible.