02/25/2004: Criminally Absurd
Top 5 Ridiculous Lawsuits of 2003
or Asshats on Parade
from Common Good
A critical part of the role of judges is deciding who can sue for what, but these days anyone can sue for just about anything.
Common Good has begun what it plans to make an annual event by announcing the top five ridiculous lawsuits of 2003. While the circumstances in these cases are serious, sometimes even tragic, judges who fail to eliminate unreasonable or extortionate suits only add to America's growing fear of litigation and undermine the common good.
- Parents can sue Chinese restaurant for hot tea burn, even though a child from their family caused the burn by spinning the lazy susan.
- Student can get injunction against school preventing it from allowing another student to share the award of Valedictorian.
- Truck driver, who lied about having driver's license, wins suit to get unemployment benefits.
- Woman who broke her arm on backyard snow luge can sue neighbor who invited her and other friends and neighbors to use the luge.
- Victim of beating by foster kids can sue state for failing to properly raise them.
3 Annotations Submitted
Wednesday the 25th of February, prof noted:
i'm suing athena associates for making me waste time at work
Wednesday the 25th of February, crazywriterinla noted:
the valedictorian thing pissed me off. i know al gore didnt set a precedence, but there is something called being a good loser. People need to practice it more often.
Wednesday the 25th of February, Abe Froman noted:
It only said that this cases were brought before a judge, right? Its not like they all necessarily won their case, right? Right? God I hope so. Except the Truck Driver who didn't have a license, it said he won. And hey if he worked he gets benefits. They should have caught that one when he was hired. The rest are just being litigious and don't deserve squat.
Hey Crazywriterinla - read that again. The person suing is the one who won Valedictorian, that makes them a sore winner. "I'm the valedictorian, ME!!! just me ... I'm not sharing the title, their not getting my face time or air time at the graduation. I will rule graduation with an iron fist. Ha ha ha ha (maniacal laugh)"