On February 8th this year, twenty-five-year-old delivery driver Michael Garcia pulled into a Starbucks drive-through in Southern Los Angeles and ordered three cups of hot tea. The Starbucks barista passed the order to him through the window in a cardboard drink carrier. The Starbucks security camera shows that within less than two seconds, an improperly secured cup in the tray with 180-degree tea toppled over into his lap, causing a second cup to do the same. The tea spill caused life-changing permanent injuries,s including third-degree burns and nerve damage to his genitals, which resulted in multiple surgeries as well as daily pain. He required two skin grafts on his penis which was permanently disfigured and caused painful sexual intercourse. A lawsuit was filed alleging negligence regarding the unsecured cups of scalding tea. Garcia’s attorney Nick Rowley argued for a verdict of $125 million. The jurors deliberated for only forty minutes before delivering a $50 Million verdict in favor of Garcia. During deliberations, three jurors dissented because they believed the verdict should be 125 million dollars.

It turns out that before the trial, Starbucks had offered to settle the case for 3 Million Dollars. After negotiation, Starbucks increased the offer to $30 million, which Garcia accepted. However, he demanded this can only be done on the condition that Starbucks apologizes and changes its policies by issuing a memo to all store employees to double-check the hot drinks’ security status before handing them to customers. Starbucks refused, and the case went to trial

Starbucks argued that Garcia had been contributorily negligent and that once the customer had the tray, it has no further legal responsibility. Rowle responded to that defense by pointing out: “Starbucks says if our hands are off the drink, then no matter what happens, we’re not responsible. So, if I’m Starbucks and I hand you a drink that doesn’t have a lid that’s secured, and it’s a scalding hot, 180-degree drink, or if I hand you a drink that’s in a container and it’s loose and it’s not secured, and it falls right on you — the moment that I take my hands off of it, then you’re responsible and I, the corporation, am not. Despite being repeatedly warned about the dangers of improperly secured drinks, Starbucks chose to ignore safety.” In addition, the evidence established that the coffee chain has a documented corporate policy that hot drinks must be fully secured in the tray before being handed over to customers. Experts testified during the trial that Garcia could have done nothing to avoid his injuries, and the Los Angeles County jury agreed, finding Starbucks fully liable for his injuries.

The lawsuit is reminiscent of a famous 1994 lawsuit against McDonald’s where a jury in 1994 awarded $3 million to an Albuquerque woman who was scalded by hot coffee. Stella Liebeck, who was 79, suffered third-degree burns that required multiple skin grafts. Her lawyers had argued that McDonald’s had a history of hundreds of consumer injury complaints. Nor is that the only case Starbucks has faced legal action over spilt drinks at the drive-thru. In 2018, a 22-year-old Northern California man spent 11 days in the burn unit at UC Davis Medical Center and was left with life-changing injuries after hot tea spilled into his lap while he was picking up an order at a drive-thru. A year earlier, a woman in Denver had sued Starbucks over a drive-thru spill that severely injured her.

What are some of the factors, in addition to the outstanding plaintiff trial skills, that are notable regarding this outstanding verdict? To start with, given the amount of the verdict and the speed of reaching a verdict, we can assume this jury wanted to punish Starbucks for their conduct and likely their trial defense. That’s primarily because they had a concern for their own safety at Starbucks under the same circumstances. Self-interest is a strong motivator in jury trials. They also likely felt the Starbucks defense demonstrated a failure to accept corporate responsibility for customer safety. The jury wanted to make sure Starbucks got the message by the size of the verdict.

The settlement failure is worth noting as well. Starbucks was willing to pay $30 Million dollars in settlement, which means their own evaluation had to be that a large jury verdict was a significant potential. The plaintiff was willing to accept their offer. However, the corporation refused the plaintiff’s additional conditions to apologize and to issue a memo to all store employees to double-check the hot drinks’ security status before handing them to customers. Why? Was the refusal to apologize for the key issue? A refusal because of corporate pride? As to the safety memo, the corporation already had in place a corporate policy that hot drinks must be fully secured in the tray before being handed over to customers, so why would that be an issue? In any event, the refusal to accept the conditions cost them $20 million.

While the Starbucks verdict is monumental, in February this year, the Ford Motor Co. was assessed more than $2.5 billion in a Georgia lawsuit. The verdict was for a couple killed in a 2022 rollover crash in one of the company’s Super Duty trucks, making it the largest verdict in Georgia history. The verdict was later set aside by the state’s Court of Appeals after the court found that the Gwinnett County judge improperly prevented Ford from arguing in the second trial that it was not liable for the deaths. The automaker now holds the dubious honor of two Georgia verdicts against the company exceeding a billion dollars. That’s because this verdict was just days after a separate state court jury had awarded a $1.7 billion verdict against the same automaker in a similar suit.

The latest Georgia mega-size verdict was just rendered in March this year, when a Georgia jury found Monasanto’s parent company Bayer liable for $2.1 billion in damages to a man suing for cancer caused by the company’s Roundup weed killer. The company has been hit with more than 177.000 lawsuits involving the weedkiller and has set aside $16 billion to settle cases. Bayer has paid about $10 billion to settle disputed claims that Roundup. Over 60,000 cases are pending, for which the group has set aside $5.9 billion in legal provisions.

Just this week, a Las Vegas company, Real Water, was found liable for $3.1 billion dollars as responsible for the damage caused by its product, which it sold as “the healthiest drinking water available.” In fact, it contained a toxic chemical used in rocket fuel. The Food and Drug Administration found that at least 21 hospitalizations and one death were likely linked to the water. The company filed for bankruptcy and is no longer operating.

As a result of the Georgia verdicts, Republican Governor Brian Kemp successfully promoted tort reform measures in a tort reform bill that includes provisions that would (1) Prohibits the use of anchoring tactics by attorneys in closing arguments using the cost of fighter jets, or the number of miles a truck drove, or the salary of a professional athlete (2) calls for bifurcated Trials: Permits a party in a case to move for bifurcation of the trial, so that liability must be established before the jury hears evidence detailing the extent of the plaintiff’s damages (3) requires the plaintiff to only seek damages in the amount actually paid (or will be paid in the future) for a medical bill and (4) would restrict outside groups from bankrolling litigation. This bill restricts how lawyers can argue damages and impacts funding for costs of suit while allowing the jury to decide what a reasonable medical charge ought to be irrespective of what the patient or insurance company was actually billed. There are six state legislatures, mostly in the South, that are debating whether to install business-friendly tort reform legislation or dismantle medical malpractice guardrails. The bills run the gamut from potential game-changing legislation in Georgia to efforts in Texas to cap certain types of personal injury damages. We can anticipate more states adopting similar tort reform laws.

What can we learn from these results? To start with, we know that jury trials are about more than proving negligence. Research has established that a jury trial is a battle of impression and not a contest of logic. Humans do not make decisions simply based on intellectual analysis of the testimony and evidence. We form general impressions based on our past experiences, values, and our primitive brain’s drive for survival and self-interest. We are generally motivated to forgive ordinary mistakes but to punish wrongful acts of betrayal and failure of duties owed to others. Emotion plays a major role in all of our decisions as well. Neuroscience has proven and research has found that the great majority of our decisions are made at a subconscious level and then ratified by our intellect by offering logical reasons for our decisions without our realizing it. Verdicts like this illustrate the fact there were strong motives involving self-interest and primitive brain survival instincts. Clearly there was a motive to punish betrayal of duty of trust owed to ensure it would not happen again. The large amounts awarded were “punitive” damages. They are intended to punish and deter wrongful conduct. behind these verdicts. These concepts offer a guide on how we should approach our trial tactics.

The other obvious observation is that the corporate and political powers of industry will not tolerate verdicts of this kind without taking steps to prevent them. They will take action to corrupt the legal system through legislation and the judicial system by the judges selected to serve. We can anticipate a strong surge of tort reform efforts nationally and in our state.