Girl Claims Price Scanner Gave Her Tourette's Syndrome 558
Attorneys for Dominica Juliano claim that she was burned and developed psychological problems after a store clerk aimed a hand-held price scanner at her face. Store attorneys say their scanners uses a harmless LED light and that the girl had serious health problems before she was scanned. From the article: "Dominica Juliano was 12 when she and her grandmother entered the Country Fair store in Erie in June 2004. A clerk allegedly called the girl 'grumpy' before flashing his hand-held bar code scanner over her face and telling her to smile. Attorneys for Ms. Juliano and her guardian say the girl was sensitive to light and burned, and later developed post-traumatic stress and Tourette's syndrome."
Re:Fire that Judge (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Fire that Judge (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not aware of any scanners that use infrared. Not any type that are used in a retail setting anyway.
Almost all of them are monochromatic red lasers or LEDs.
The red lasers can only burn if you're shining it in your eyes. They're capped at 5mw of total laser output, and at that level you need to quite a period of time to cause damage.
Re:Fire that Judge (Score:4, Interesting)
It's the job of the courts to hear arguments and settle them. They're suing. There could be merit. Ok, there isn't, but we actually understand the power put off by these scanners. Experts will testify, and the girl will lose.
It's the lawyers we need to do something about. Lawyers are taking on frivolous cases, regardless how little merit there is, hoping that there is an out of court settlement. It's cheaper for most companies to just settle, rather than be dragged through court. Unfortunately, this is the nation of litigation, and anyone can sue anyone for anything at any time. It's a huge industry. Every day on the radio, I hear ads for traffic attorneys. If you're in an accident, they want you to sue regardless of which side you were on. You can crash your car into someone else, and I'd bet a lawyer would be more than happy to sue the victim because they were in the way.
I was in an accident once where something like this happened. A guy was on his bicycle waiting for me to pull out into traffic. He sat there for about 10 minutes. When there was finally a break in traffic for me to pull into, he rode in front of me. He wasn't hurt, and his bike was fine. The cops even ticketed him for being dumb. Ok, the ticket didn't read that, but that's basically what it was. He wanted me to pay for his bent kickstand. Ok, $20, big deal, right? Nope, $200. I asked for a receipt, and he wouldn't produce it. I told him to talk to my insurance company. I had a nice talk with them later. The price had increased to $300. They told me he's pretty well known in the area for doing stunts like that. It was cheaper for them to pay the $300, rather than have their lawyers go to court and argue it through a trial. He did dent the hood of my car, and I didn't even ask for that to be paid. It was a shitty car, I didn't care. It was something to complain about though. Since that happened, I pay extra attention for people like that. I've had several walk in front of me to get hit. It's not accidental either. They'll step out, I'll come to a quick stop, and they'll look at me like "Why didn't you hit me?", and then try the next lane of traffic. I don't know, I'd never see money as a good enough reason to get hit by a few thousand pounds of vehicle.
Re:Fire that Judge (Score:3, Interesting)
"I think the claims are ridiculous" is not a valid legal reason for denying the person of their right to seek justice under the law.
Is this true? I actually thought that was exactly what a judge could do. (I am not a lawyer, so I don't know, and this is an honest question.)
uhh... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Fire that Judge (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, we had some infrared laser retail scanners about 10 years ago. The scanner included a red LED that was (supposed to be) focused on the same spot as the IR laser, making it easy for the cashier to aim. So the big red line the cashier saw wasn't doing the scanning -- it was the IR laser.
Re:Grumpy (Score:3, Interesting)
The town I grew up in had an ice cream shop run by a guy with Tourette's. He never swore, he'd just shout, "Hey!" sometimes. What I found fascinating, though, was that it would never happen while he was playing the trumpet. Somehow, concentrating on that kept the symptoms in check. Needless to say, he was a fantastic trumpet player because he practiced all the time. :)
I wonder how he's doing now.