DURANGO, Colo. (Reuters) - A Colorado judge ordered two teen-age girls to pay about $900 for the distress a neighbor said they caused by giving her home-made cookies adorned with paper hearts.
The pair were ordered to pay $871.70 plus $39 in court costs after neighbor Wanita Renea Young, 49, filed a lawsuit complaining that the unsolicited cookies, left at her house after the girls knocked on her door, had triggered an anxiety attack that sent her to the hospital the next day.
Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitte, 18, paid the judgment on Thursday after a small claims court ruling by La Plata County Court Judge Doug Walker, a court clerk said on Friday.
The girls baked cookies as a surprise for several of their rural Colorado neighbors on July 31 and dropped off small batches on their porches, accompanied by red or pink paper hearts and the message: "Have a great night."
The Denver Post newspaper reported on Friday that the girls had decided to stay home and bake the cookies rather than go to a dance where there might be cursing and drinking.It reported that six neighbors wrote letters entered as evidence in the case thanking the girls for the cookies.
But Young said she was frightened because the two had knocked on her door at about 10:30 p.m. and run off after leaving the cookies.
She went to a hospital emergency room the next day, fearing that she had
suffered a heart attack, court records said.
The judge awarded Young her medical costs, but did not award punitive
damages. He said he did not think the girls had acted maliciously but that 10:30
was fairly late at night for them to be out.
5.2.05
This is unbelievable.
4 Comments:
At 9:31 PM, Scarlett said…
I suffer from acute anxiety. My shiatsu teacher states my spleen-stomach is in distress. I have not have had a spleen since it was removed splintered in a life-threatening car accident when I was six. I told him this because I can not understand how my spleen is distressed when it is not there? He changes the subject. But I digress. My point is ... anxiety hits you immediately and forcefully. If that was your first attack, you would not wait to go for medical treatment the next day unless you are lawsuit hungry, mean and vindictive. I don't know what the judge's excuse is except maybe he is hot-headed and then I would say his heart is in distress. But, then I have had too much shiatsu training this week.
At 11:52 PM, p.p. said…
"the girls had decided to stay home and bake the cookies rather than go to a dance where there might be cursing and drinking."
Serves them right! Next time they will choose the righteous path: cursing and drinking!
At 12:03 AM, Dern said…
WTF.
Guess kindness to strangers is not legal?
(Devils advocate: 10:30 is kinda late to be knocking on strangers doors)
At 1:04 AM, Ontario Emperor said…
I also heard that the parents had offered to pay the woman's medical costs, but she refused and went to court trying to seek punitive damages.
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