Reference no: EM13946189

The case referred to in the article is the 1992 landmark case reported as Liebeck V McDonalds Restaurants. It is a case that elicited more than just a couple concerns. Twenty four years on and it still raises just as many eyebrows as it did back then, not as much for legal scholars though. To a layman, the dispute must have appeared as a frivolous suit, but not in the eyes of the law. The first thing to note is that the law is aware of the fact that corporates are more powerful than individual persons. That means that the likelihood of a matter being decided in favor of a corporation at the expense of an individual is rare. This is just a punitive measure to keep corporates in check, much like the laws on interpretation of standard form contracts.

McDonalds testified to maintaining their coffee at between 180 and 190 degrees while most establishments of the same kind averaged 130 degrees. This alone would possibly swing the verdict against the former unless they could prove vide expert opinion that their derogation increased no chance of harm. Another nail to that coffin was the fact that between the years 1982 and 1992, they had received complaints to the tune of 700 but blatantly refused to have a change in their mode of operation. The only defense which in my opinion was a weak one was that the exaggerated temperatures gave the coffee an unnatural taste. Drawing our attention to the Faxe beer case, the amount of alcohol allowed in alcoholic beverages classified as beer were not allowed beyond 6.5%.Faxe on the other hand created and sold beer with an alcohol percentage of 10. In those circumstances it was impossible to escape liability. That is how the McDonald's cookie crumbled.

It may have been common knowledge that coffee is served hot but it is also common knowledge that anything above 140 degrees could cause third degree burns; you'd be surprised how much of the "common knowledge" is not actually common. Regardless, that means that McDonald's were technically serving a weapon in a coffee cup. The worst part was that while their assumption that people took their coffee in the offices and not at the points of sale was disgraced by their own study, they still didn't see it as a ticking time bomb. There is a tort concept known as the attractive nuisance; it dictates that if have something that is hazardous yet may seem attractive to some people especially children, the mentally disturbed or the old, then you shall be liable for any injuries caused. Such was McDonald's fate. The case of Bernett Vs Stanely discussed it in more detail.

The liability apportioned to McDonald's arose from legal concepts of consumer protection law and Tort law. In Tort, the magic word was negligence. Defined, the word means failing to exercise reasonable care to prevent harm to another person, that I quote lord Denning while commenting on the case of Rylands Vs Fletcher. In the immediate case, McDonald's would have at least kept their coffee at a lower temperature. For all we know, cannabis sativa bakes interesting cakes but you don't see bakeries adding it to the dough, at least not legally. The defendants owed the plaintiff a duty of care (also a concept of tort law) which they breached. The duty of care is simply the responsibility anyone has towards anyone to ensure that the actions of that first anyone do not cause injury to the second anyone. This was the ruling in the case of Donoghue Vs Stevenson. Though in the latter case, the plaintiff did not suffer that much material damage and the award was merely punitive.


There was a direct link between the defendant's actions and the plaintiff's injury; causation. To prove negligence one must prove that the actions of one directly led to the injury on another, a fact McDonalds could not contest. The actions of McDonalds were very proximate to the injury to the plaintiff both in space and time. In other words it was foreseeable that serving coffee at 190 degrees wouldn't end well. Finally the injury on the plaintiff seemed to have aggravated the claim further. In the Donoghue case, the injury was marginal but in the latter case, it wasn't. The court took it upon itself to protect anyother person from such thus the punitive damages.

Of Course there are a number of defenses that the defendants put forth considering the plaintiff invoked res ipsalocitar which means everything is self-explanatory. The defendants knowingly served hot coffee to the plaintiff who suffered injury as a result. It was McDonald's case to defend rather than the plaintiff's to claim, that is what it means. The defense of inevitable accident failed because the threshold for that is that the injury must not only be unexpected but also couldn't be avoided even if they exercised reasonable care; Holmes v Mather. Further it was stressed in Fardon Vs Harcourt Rivington the chance of injury must be so remote that cannot be foreseen by a reasonable man.

Volenti non fit injuria - the plaintiff consented to injury also could not stand seeing that the plaintiff did not consent to hot coffee. Unlike in Hall Vs Brooklands where consent was implied by being at the venue, buying coffee did not constitute consent. Looking into this case closely would reveal that as a matter of fact, McDonalds was lucky to get away with the fine which was small compared to what they make anyway. Courts have seen corporate bodies go under because of inability to comply with court orders. 
One question still lingers however; how much warning is actually adequate warning? Because it went on record that there was a warning on the 

Thanks, Ahmed - good information and analysis here.  When we consider the duty owed in regards to a property owner, like a business  - we consider the "status" of its patrons.  In other words, the owner's duty depends on the person injured on their property.  Was the person injured a customer and thus an invitee?  Or, was the person injured a licensee, thus someone with permission to be on the property but for limited reasons?  The text identifies the law in regards to landowners and their liability.  Can you identify the four categories and what duty is owed to them?  Which is owed the highest duty and why?