After learning all of the specifics in the first coffee lawsuit, I actually agree with the lady who sued. McDonalds’ SOP was to keep the coffee at a minimum of 180 degrees to keep from having to dump old coffee during slow times. The company claimed it saved them around a million dollars a day to keep it at this temp. The lady had third degree burns and had to have skin grafts. The jurors declared that $1.89 million was just under two day’s worth of savings from McDonalds’ 180 degree temperature SOP. The SOP has since been revised. I don’t know how to post pics, but here’s a link to one pic. WARNING: The image is extremely graphic and disturbing!
The link I added to post #2 discusses this case, and refutes a great deal of the pro-plaintiff bias given in trial lawyers’ explanations of the case.
I saw the documentary “Hot Coffee” that supposedly went into all the specifics of this case. The film was heavily slanted against tort reform and used the cases in the film to illustrate why tort reform was bad. The following are the articles and info I found regarding the film and from the coffee maker industry. For what it’s worth:
Articles on the documentary “Hot Coffee”:
http://overlawyered.com/2011/06/hot-coffee-documentary-hbo-reviewed/
http://overlawyered.com/2006/11/two-more-hot-coffee-lawsuit-data-points/
http://overlawyered.com/2004/08/stella-liebeck-and-mcdonalds-coffee-revisited-ii/
Articles from Coffee Industry people on the proper temp for coffee makers:
http://www.huladaddy.com/coffee-talk/how-hot-is-your-coffeemaker.htm
http://www.wral.com/5onyourside/story/4186689/
