Enough with the Hot Beverage Lawsuits

July 3rd, 2010. By AbiK

Flashback, 1992. Stella Liebeck. Hot coffee. From McDonald’s. You remember the case. Personal injury. She was in a car—I believe her grandson’s—riding shotgun when the coffee she received from a McDonald’s drive-thru. Apparently the car was not in motion when she went to take the lid off the coffee to add cream and sugar. And, apparently there had been a fair number of claims over the ten years prior to this incident where folks had complained about Mickey Dee’s coffee being too hot. Yes, temps were taken and the coffee you have at home is apparently 135 to 140 degrees; the drive-thru coffee was 185 degrees (plus or minus five degrees). So yeah, it was hot. And Liebeck got burned.

There was a fair amount of public outcry about this case—even though Ms. Liebeck did get burned. It seemed frivolous to many—myself included. Not because McDonald’s was in the right. But because of this question: What is the reasonable expectation that a person might get burned by a cup of hot coffee?. If you ask me, it’s pretty reasonable to expect that such might happen. Contrast with the very sad and unfortunate case that just happened last week in New York City—the baby that died as a result of a tree limb falling at the Central Park Zoo. There is no reasonable expectation that a tree limb—one that hangs on trees that are reportedly pruned regularly—will fall out of the blue and strike someone. It’s a freak of nature. Unexpected. Inexplicable. And with terrible consequences.

Not so the coffee. You buy it knowing and expecting it to be hot. Don’t believe me? Try grabbing a quick cup of Joe from Dunkin Donuts—and take a sip pronto. You’ll know what hot is. And yet, hot is an expectation of its customers. And along with that comes some risk. Risk that I know to bear personally—and to drink responsibly as a result of.

So here we are…fast-forward to 2010. Scene: Starbucks in Bensonhurst, NY. Villona Maryash orders tea. She’s in the Starbucks with her 5-month old son in a stroller next to her. She receives the tea, and according to nypost.com, awaits her food order. She picks up the tea to take a sip, and heavens to Betsy—realizes it’s hot. So she drops it. The tea spills over her son, “causing ‘serious injuries'”.

Here’s the beef: the lawsuit claims the tea was “improperly served”. That it did not have the omnipresent protective sleeve on it (and gee, is it now enough for coffee houses to simply provide a stack of the sleeves at the milk and sugar bar, as so many do?). Maryash’s lawyer goes as far as to say “proper” serving would’ve also meant it would’ve come on a tray as well. When was the last time you ordered a drink—sans food as the food wasn’t there yet—and got it on a tray at an establishment where, I’m guessing, 85% of the patrons order drinks to-go?

I don’t know what damages are being sought. And I am certainly sorry that a young, innocent and helpless child was on the receiving end of the spilled tea. That’s not in question here. But when will we learn that a hot beverage is, uh, HOT? That extra care needs to be taken upon taking a hot drink from the cashier. That it’s reasonable to expect that the hot drink may be just hot enough to cause a burn…

Tags: hot coffee, hot tea, starbucks

This was posted on Saturday, July 3rd, 2010 at 9:03 am and is filed under Personal Injury . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.