STELLA AWARDS

 It's time once again to review the winners of the Annual "Stella

 Awards." The Stella Awards are named after 81 year old Stella Liebeck

 who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonald's (in

 New  Mexico ). That case inspired the Stella Awards for the most

 frivolous, ridiculous, successful lawsuits in the United States. Here

 are this year's winners:

 5th Place (tie): 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 owners of the store were

 understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving

 little toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.

 5th Place (tie): 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and

 medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda

 Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the

 wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hubcaps.

 5th Place (tie): Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania was leaving a

 house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able

 to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was

 malfunctioning.  He couldn't re-enter the house because the door

 connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The

 family was on vacation, and  Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the

 garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a

 large bag of dry dog food.  He sued the homeowner's insurance claiming

 the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the

 tune of $500,000.  In my opinion this is so outrageous that it should

 have been 2nd Place!

 4th Place: Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500

 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door

 neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard.

 The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have

 been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who had climbed

 over the fence into the yard and was shooting it repeatedly with a

 pellet gun.

 3rd Place: A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of

 Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and

 broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms.

 Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an

 argument.

 2nd Place: Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware successfully sued the owner

 of a nightclub in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom

 window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred

 while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies

 room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge.  She was awarded $12,000

 and dental expenses.

 AND.....

 1st Place: This year's runaway winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski of

 Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mrs. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot

 Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home, (from an OU football

 game), having driven onto the freeway, she set the cruise control at 70

 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back & make herself

 a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the RV left the freeway, crashed and

 overturned. Mrs. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising her in the

 owner's manual that she couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded her

 $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their

 manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other

 complete morons around.