Jury
Brooded with tea: Starbucks must pay delivery drivers $ 50 million
With hot Starbucks tea, a man in California scattered the genitals. A jury said he was very compensation – Starbucks wants to appeal against the judgment.
Michael Garcia was picking up a tea from a Starbucks-Drive-Thru in Los Angeles when the accident happened. The mug overturned in the car, the hot content poured over the delivery driver’s lap. Garcia suffered burns third.
The tea had scalded his genitals, the man from California had to have skin transplants and other treatments carried out. After the mishap in February 2020, Michael Garcia went to court against Starbucks and sued the company for compensation. His lawyers argued that he was disfigured forever. A jury in Los Angeles gave Garcia right-and granted him compensation of $ 50 million (the equivalent of around 46 million euros).
Starbucks suggested comparison, victims declined
The jury saw it as proven that the mug’s lid was not sufficiently secured. “This jury judgment is an important step to blame Starbucks for disregarding customer security,” said one of Garcia’s lawyers after the judgment. His client suffered “distortion, pain, dysfunction and psychological damage” through the accident.
According to the law firm, which Garcia represents, Starbucks made a comparison with a payment of $ 30 million-including a confidentiality clause. The victim and his lawyers did not want to get involved. Starbucks expressed sympathy towards Garcia, but did not want to publicly apologize for the incident and wants to appeal against the jury’s judgment. “With the decision of the jury that we are responsible for this incident, we do not agree and consider the compensation awarded to be excessive,” said the company.
The case is reminiscent of a lawsuit from the nineties: At that time, a woman had suffered from McDonald’s burns through hot coffee. A jury appealed to her three million dollars. A judge later reduced the amount to an unknown sum below $ 600,000.
EPP
Source: Stern
