The TRUE Stella Awards -- 2003 Winners
by Randy Cassingham
Issued 21 January 2004
Unlike the FAKE cases that have been highly circulated online for the
last several years (see http://www.StellaAwards.com/bogus.html for
details), the following cases have been researched from public sources and
are confirmed TRUE by the ONLY legitimate source for the Stella Awards:
www.StellaAwards.com . To confirm this copy is legitimate, see
http://www.StellaAwards.com/2003.html
-v-
THE RUNNERS UP FOR THE 2003 TRUE STELLA AWARDS ARE:
#8: Stephen Joseph of San Francisco, Calif. Joseph runs a non-profit
group whose goal is to ban the "trans fats" used in many processed foods
and which are indeed very unhealthy. But to help gain publicity for his
cause, Joseph, an attorney, chose one food that uses trans fats -- Oreo
cookies -- and sued Kraft Foods for putting the stuff in the snack. The
resulting publicity over "suing Oreos" was so intense that Joseph
dropped the suit after just 13 days. He never even served the suit on
Kraft, showing that he had no interest in actually getting the case
heard in court. What real cases got pushed aside during his abuse of the
courts to get publicity for his pet organization?
#7: Shawn Perkins of Laurel, Ind. Perkins was hit by lightning in the
parking lot Paramount's Kings Island amusement park in Mason, Ohio. A
classic "act of God", right? No, says Perkins' lawyer. "That would be a
lot of people's knee-jerk reaction in these types of situations." The
lawyer has filed suit against the amusement park asking unspecified
damages, arguing the park should have "warned" people not to be outside
during a thunderstorm.
#6: Caesar Barber, 56, of New York City. Barber, who is 5-foot-10 and 270
pounds, says he is obese, diabetic, and suffers from heart disease
because fast food restaurants forced him to eat their fatty food four to
five times per week. He filed suit against McDonald's, Burger King,
Wendy's and KFC, who "profited enormously" and asked for unspecified
damages because the eateries didn't warn him that junk food isn't good
for him. The judge threw the case out twice, and barred it from being
filed a third time. Is that the end of such McCases? No way: lawyers
will just find another plaintiff and start over, legal scholars say.
#5: Cole Bartiromo, 18, of Mission Viejo, Calif. After making over $1
million in the stock market, the feds made Bartiromo pay it all back: he
gained his profits, they said, using fraud. Bartiromo played baseball at
school, but after his fraud case broke he was no longer allowed to
participate in extracurricular sports. Bartiromo clearly learned a lot
while sitting in federal court: he wrote and filed his own lawsuit
against his high school, reasoning that he had planned on a pro baseball
career but, because he was kicked off the school's team, pro scouts
wouldn't be able to discover him. His suit demands the school reimburse
him for the great salary he would have made in the majors, which he
figures is $50 million.
#4: Priest David Hanser, 70. Hanser was one of the first Catholic priests
to be caught up in the sex abuse scandal. In 1990, he settled a suit
filed by one of his victims for $65,000. In the settlement, Hanser
agreed not to work with children anymore, but the victim learned that
Hanser was ignoring that part of the agreement. The victim appealed to
the church, asking it to stop Hanser from working near children, but the
church would not intervene. "It's up to the church to decide where he
works," argued the priest's lawyer. When the outraged victim went to the
press to warn the public that a pedo priest was near children, Hanser
sued him for the same $65,000 because he violated his own part of the
deal -- to keep the settlement secret. The message is clear: shut up
about outrageous abuse, or we'll sue you for catching us.
#3: Wanda Hudson, 44, of Mobile, Ala. After Hudson lost her home to
foreclosure, she moved her belongings to a storage unit. She says she
was inside her unit one night "looking for some papers" when the storage
yard manager found the door to her unit ajar -- and locked it. She
denies that she was sleeping inside, but incredibly did not call for
help or bang on the door to be let out! She was not found for 63 days
and barely survived; the formerly "plump" 150-pound woman lived on food
she just happened to have in the unit, and was a mere 83 pounds when she
was found. She sued the storage yard for $10 million claiming
negligence. Even though the jury was not allowed to learn that Hudson
had previously diagnosed mental problems, it found Hudson was nearly 100
percent responsible for her own predicament -- but still awarded her
$100,000.
#2: Doug Baker, 45, of Portland, Ore. Baker says God "steered" him to a
stray dog. He admits "People thought I was crazy" to spend $4,000 in vet
bills to bring the injured mutt back to health, but hey, it was God's
dog! But $4,000 was nothing: he couldn't even take his girlfriend out to
dinner without getting a dog-sitter to watch him. When the skittish dog
escaped the sitter, Baker didn't just put an ad in the paper, he bought
display ads so he could include a photo. His business collapsed since he
devoted full time to the search for the dog. He didn't propose to his
girlfriend because he wanted the dog to deliver the ring to her. He
hired four "animal psychics" to give him clues to the animal's
whereabouts, and hired a witch to cast spells. He even spread his own
urine around to "mark his territory" to try to lure the dog home! And,
he said, he cried every day. Two months in to the search, he went
looking for the dog where it got lost -- and quickly found it. His first
task: he put a collar on the mutt. (He hadn't done that before for a dog
that was so "valuable"?!) After finding the dog, he sued the dog sitter,
demanding $20,000 for the cost of his search, $30,000 for the income he
lost by letting his business collapse, $10,000 for "the temporary loss
of the special value" of the dog, and $100,000 in "emotional damages" --
$160,000 total. God has not been named as a defendant.
AND THE WINNER of the 2003 True Stella Awards: The City of Madera, Calif.
Madera police officer Marcy Noriega had the suspect from a minor
disturbance handcuffed in the back of her patrol car. When the suspect
started to kick at the car's windows, Officer Noriega decided to subdue
him with her Taser. Incredibly, instead of pulling her stun gun from her
belt, she pulled her service sidearm and shot the man in the chest,
killing him instantly. The city, however, says the killing is not the
officer's fault; it argues that "any reasonable police officer" could
"mistakenly draw and fire a handgun instead of the Taser device" and has
filed suit against Taser, arguing the company should pay for any award
from the wrongful death lawsuit the man's family has filed. What a slur
against every professionally trained police officer who knows the
difference between a real gun and a stun gun! And what a cowardly
attempt to escape responsibility for the actions of its own
under-trained officer.
TO CONFIRM THE VALIDITY OF THESE CASES, get more information on the True
Stella Awards, or sign up for a free e-mail subscription to new cases as
they are issued, see http://www.StellaAwards.com/2003.html
Copyright 2004 www.StellaAwards.com . This message may be forwarded as
long as it remains complete and unaltered.