Don’t Believe The ‘Stella Awards’ Emails!

Every year, chain emails about the ‘Stella Awards’ are forwarded. These emails contain false stories about lawsuits and are designed to make you think that people are getting rich off of frivolous lawsuits that are ruining our country. Don’t believe this propaganda.

Snopes.org, a website that ‘fact checks’ urban legends like the ‘Stella Awards,’ has throughly debunked the lawsuit misinformation in these ‘Stella Awards’ emails. The mythical lawsuits described in the ‘Stella Awards’ emails are not funny and have serious consequences regarding how our civil justice system is perceived. If a jury panel enters a courtroom under the impression that our civil justice system is nothing but ‘jackpot justice,’ consider how difficult that makes it for the overwhelming amount of good people who have legitimate claims to recover for their losses.

These ‘Stella Awards’ are named after Stella Lieback, the elderly woman who became famous for her role in the ‘McDonald’s Hot Coffee’ case. Myths abound about that coffee case as well. For the truth about the McDonald’s Hot Coffee case as well as the facts about other myths about our civil justice system, read The American Association of Justice’s ‘Debunking the Myths’ web page. Once you know the facts, as did the jury of people just like you, you’ll see there is a lot more to the McDonald’s Hot Coffee case than you’ve been told.

Consider another specific ‘Stella Awards’ myth, where a driver under the impression that a car can drive itself recovers a substantial amount of money after leaving the cruise control on a vehicle and ignoring the road. If it sounds unbelievable, that’s because it is not true. Yet, these myths persist, which is just fine with ‘tort reform’ advocates. Here’s a Snopes summary about this ‘cruise control’ myth.

When you receive information like the ‘Stella Awards’ emails, check the facts and don’t allow people to trash our civil justice system with falsehoods.