David Davison is stunned by the arrogance of the plaintiffs and the stupidity of the jurors in this year's infamous 'Stella Awards'.

Charities seem to have been in the courts a lot recently – think RSPCA and its lost legacy, Catholic Care’s appeal against the Charity Commission ruling, and Hirwaun YMCA challenging its pension debt.  Hard to say if it’s a growing trend or just a spate, at this stage…

But the courts are busy in the States too. This week I had something called the ‘Stella Awards’ brought to my attention. For those of you who were unaware of these, like me, the annual Stella Awards are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued the McDonald’s restaurant (I use the term loosely), where she purchased coffee, for the burns she suffered having taken the lid off the coffee and put it between her knees while she was driving!! Now who would ever have thought they could get burned doing that?!!

So the ‘Stellas’ celebrate (if that’s the right word!!) the most outlandish legal cases and verdicts in the U.S.

This years results, as tradition demands, in reverse order, are:-

•    SEVENTH PLACE – a lady in Texas being awarded $80,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler running inside a furniture store. The store owners were understandably surprised by the verdict, considering the running toddler was her own son.    
•    SIXTH PLACE – a California man won $74,000 plus medical expenses when his neighbour drove over his hand. The man apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbour's hubcaps.
•    FIFTH PLACE – a man from Pennsylvania who was leaving a house he had just burgled via the garage. Unfortunately, the automatic garage door opener malfunctioned and he could not get the garage door to open. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the garage to the house locked when he pulled it shut. He was forced to sit for eight days surviving only on a case of cola and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance company claiming undue mental anguish. Amazingly, the jury said the insurance company must pay $500,000 for his anguish - we should all have this kind of anguish.
•    FOURTH PLACE – a man from Arkansas was awarded $14,500 plus medical expenses after being bitten in the rear by his next door neighbour's dog - even though the dog was on a chain in its owner's fenced off garden. The man didn’t get as much as he’d claimed as the jury believed the dog might have been provoked as the man had climbed over the fence and repeatedly shot the dog with a pellet gun.  
•    THIRD PLACE – a woman from Pennsylvania was awarded $113,500 by a restaurant after she slipped on a spilled soft drink and broke her tailbone. The reason the soft drink was on the floor was that she had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.
•    SECOND PLACE – a woman from Delaware sued the owner of a night club in a nearby city because she fell from the bathroom window to the floor, knocking out her two front teeth. Even though she was trying to sneak through the ladies toilet window to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge, the jury said the night club had to pay her $12,000 plus dental expenses.
•    FIRST PLACE - The runaway winner was a lady from Oklahoma who purchased a new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home whilst on the motorway she set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the driver's seat to go to the back of the Winnebago to make herself a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the motor home left the motorway, crashed and overturned. She sued Winnebago for not including in the owner's manual that she couldn't actually leave the driver's seat while the cruise control was set. The Oklahoma jury awarded her $1,750,000 PLUS a new motor home. Winnebago actually changed their manuals as a result of this case, just in case any of her relatives might also buy a motor home.

It could only happen in America – or could it???