A jury in South Florida determined that McDonald’s and a franchise holder were at blame after a hot Chicken McNugget from a Happy Meal dropped on a young girl’s leg and resulted in second-degree burns, in a case reminiscent of the well-known hot coffee litigation of the 1990s.
According to the South Florida SunSentinel, a second jury will decide how much money will be given to the girl and her mother by McDonald’s USA and Upchurch Foods, the franchise’s owner.
Jurors on Thursday reached a divided verdict, holding McDonald’s USA responsible for failing to offer guidelines for handling hot food safely and the franchise holder negligent for failing to warn customers about the risk of doing so. The jury rejected the claim that McDonald’s USA was negligent and did not find the product to be faulty.
Brent Upchurch, the owner and operator of McDonald’s, issued a statement saying, “Our sympathies go out to this family for what occurred in this unfortunate incident, as we hold customer safety as one of our highest priorities.” “The facts show that our restaurant in Tamarac, Florida did in fact follow those protocols when cooking and serving this Happy Meal,” the company stated in response to the ruling.
Two days of testimony and arguments about the 2019 incident, which left the 4-year-old daughter with a scorched upper thigh, were presented to the jury.
According to the SunSentinel, Philana Holmes testified that she purchased Happy Meals for her son and her daughter, who was four years old at the time, at a McDonald’s drive-thru in Tamarac, close to Fort Lauderdale. Her kids were sitting in the backseat when she gave them the food.
Her daughter screamed when she turned on the car. According to the newspaper, the mother said she had no idea what was happening until she pulled over to assist Olivia Caraballo, who is now 7 years old. She noticed the burn on the girl’s leg and used her iPhone to take pictures and record audio of the child’s screaming.
In court, the girl’s screams could be heard. The autistic child did not give a testimony, according to the publication.
McDonald’s attorneys argued that the meal needed to be hot to prevent salmonella illness and that the nuggets were not intended to be pushed for more than two minutes between a seat belt and human flesh.
The girl’s parents filed a lawsuit, alleging that McDonald’s and the franchise owner had overcooked the food and failed to sufficiently train staff members or alert customers to its “dangerous” temperature.
The temperature was argued to be above 200 degrees (93 Celsius) by the family’s attorneys although the defense said it was no higher than 160 degrees (71 Celsius). Both parties agreed the nugget caused the burns.
The case is likely to bring back memories of the McDonald’s coffee lawsuit from the 1990s, which, despite the fact that a jury and court had determined it to be everything but frivolous, turned into a sort of urban legend about lawsuits that appeared to be frivolous.
Stella Liebeck, 81, was scalded in 1992 by hot coffee from McDonald’s that spilled onto her lap and burned her legs, groin, and buttocks as she attempted to steady the cup with her legs while prying the lid off to add cream outside a drive-thru. A New Mexico jury awarded Stella Liebeck $2.7 million in punitive damages.
She was hospitalized for more than a week with third-degree burns.
She had first requested $20,000 from McDonald’s to cover hospital costs, but the firm filed a lawsuit. Later, a court lowered the $2.7 million award to $480,000, saying that this was fair given McDonald’s “willful, wanton, reckless” and “callous” actions.