A Los Angeles jury is ordering Starbucks to pay a Postmates delivery driver $50 million for burns he sustained while picking up a drive-through order.
On Friday, nine members of the jury, the minimum required to agree, ruled that Starbucks must pay the driver, Michael Garcia, $50 million in damages after they deliberated for roughly half a day.
Lawyers for Mr. Garcia told jurors during the phase when they determined damages that the burns from the spill, which occurred about 1.4 seconds after he was handed his drink order, caused “injury and damage to every facet of his life.” However, attorneys for the coffee chain suggested that the beverage may not have been the sole cause of his injuries.
The finding comes a week after the jury unanimously found that the coffee chain was entirely responsible for Mr. Garcia’s injuries.
Mr. Garcia’s lawyer, Nick Rowley, argued that the barista at the drive-through window did not properly secure one of the lids on the beverages before handing it to their client.
Mr. Rowley said surveillance footage from February 8, 2020, the date of the incident, showed that the barista did not fully secure one of the three cups in a drink tray when handing it to his client, in violation of Starbucks’ policy.
“This young man did nothing to cause this to happen,” Mr. Rowley said.
An attorney for Starbucks, Stephen Pelletier, pushed back by stating that the spill occurred once Mr. Garcia had control of the beverages. He also pointed to the fact that Mr. Garcia’s dog was in the vehicle and unrestrained, which they said could have contributed to the drink spilling.
Additionally, Mr. Pelletier suggested that Mr. Garcia did not exhibit the same degree of care when receiving the drinks to ensure that they did not spill as he had with the other times he picked up orders.
He told jurors, “In this case, the handoff was successful, and it must be evaluated from the point where the drinks are moved from the counter all the way to the point where the drink spilled.”
A spokeswoman for Starbucks, Jaci Anderson, told the Sun, “We sympathize with Mr. Garcia, but we disagree with the jury’s decision that we were at fault for this incident and believe the damages awarded to be excessive. We plan to appeal. We have always been committed to the highest safety standards in our stores, including the handling of hot drinks.”
Mr. Garcia’s attorneys originally asked for $75 to $125 million in damages, while Starbucks’ legal team argued $7.5 million to $10 million was a more reasonable amount.
The jury’s decision comes more than 30 years after the famous case Liebeck v. McDonald’s Restaurants. The case centered around a 79-year-old woman, Stella Liebeck, and the severe burns she suffered after spilling coffee from McDonald’s.
Ms. Liebeck was sitting in the passenger seat of a car driven by her grandson, and she placed the coffee between her legs and took the cup’s lid off while the vehicle was parked when she spilled the beverage, causing serious burns.
Ms. Liebeck asked the fast-food chain to compensate her for the injury. She acknowledged the spill was her fault but took issue with the temperature of the coffee and asked for anywhere between $10,000 and $20,000 to pay for her medical expenses.
However, McDonald’s only offered her $800, and she went to court and won her lawsuit. The case initially became a symbol of frivolous lawsuits as the jury awarded Ms. Liebeck $200,000 in compensatory damages and $2.7 million in punitive damages – which was later reduced to $480,000.
Ms. Liebeck’s case led McDonald’s to change its policies for how it heated up coffee. Prior to her win, the chain was bringing its beverages to a scalding temperature of around 180 and 190 degrees.
While critics argued that Ms. Liebeck should have known that the coffee was hot and could have burned her, the jury in her case was shown evidence that McDonald’s was aware that the temperature at which it heated its beverages to was a hazard, but it did not change its process until Ms. Liebeck’s lawsuit.
Additionally, a 2011 documentary, “Hot Coffee,” shed new light on the injuries Ms. Liebeck sustained and helped dispel the belief that the injuries were trivial. The film highlighted pictures of the third-degree burns she suffered and noted she required skin grafts and hospitalization.
While Starbucks has been ordered to pay Mr. Garcia $50 million, it may not be done paying out damages for spilled drinks. In September 2020, another man, Tommy Piluyev, sued the coffee chain for burns he sustained in 2018 after he said the lid popped off of his tea cup and burned his stomach, hand, and genitals.
Mr. Piluyev said he had to learn to walk again and could not play the piano. The lawsuit also said “sensitivity and permanent skin discoloration and disfigurement of Mr. Piluyev’s genitals and inner thighs made eventual intimacy awkward and painful.”
A Starbucks spokesperson said the company takes “our responsibility to provide a safe environment very seriously.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
