Andrea Grigsby
MGMT 520
Week 3 Homework
You will be able to upload both attachments in the same Dropbox. The Dropbox allows you to attach multiple documents in the same submission. Failure to submit your shepardized case will result in a loss of 10 points. You will not be able to submit it after your assignment has been graded.
Your assignment is due by Sunday, end of Week 3, 11:59 p.m. (MT).
(Note: You will not submit anything to the Homework CASE Dropbox.
Questions 1-6:
Week 3 Homework answers (there are 6 questions total).

While viewing the Nadel v. Burger King & Emil case answer the following questions:

1. What court decided the case in the assignment? (2 points)
Answer: Court of Appeals Ohio, First District, Hamilton County
2. What must a party establish to prevail on a motion for summary judgment? (3 points)
Answer: In order to prevail on a motion for summary judgment, a movant has the burden to demonstrate that no genuine issue of material fact remains to be litigated; that is entitled to judgment as a matter of law, and that it appears from the evidence, when viewed most strongly in favor of the nonmoving party, that reasonable minds can come to but tone conclusion and that conclusion is adverse to the non-moving party. The movant in this case would be the Nadel family.
Nadel v. Burger King Corp., 1997 WL 266762 (Ct. App, 1st Dist., Ohio)
3. Briefly – state the facts of this case, using the information found in the case in LexisNexis. (5 points)
Answer: The Christopher Nadel, the child was suffered severe burns by the hot coffee; spilled coffee is a forseeable circumstance from going through a drive through. It was undetermined if temperature the coffee was served at was too hot. It was determined there was no breach of warranty, there was not adequate warning about the product and there was no negligence as far as the emotional damage was concerned.
4. According to the case, why was this not a case of negligent infliction of emotional distress, and what tort did the court approve?
Answer: The case of negligent infliction of emotional distress was not granted for the following reasons. The grandmother’s statement that she was ‘worried,’ but sought no professional treatment thereafter and the father had been getting psychological treatment but for other reasons as the ‘incident’ just came up and wasn’t the primary reason for treatment. The court did reverse the summary judgment in regard to the design defect and failure to warn claims in their product liability claims.
5. According to the case, why didn't the court approve summary judgment for product liability claims? (5 points)
Answer: Based on the fact that the coffee caused second degree burns was sufficient enough to raise factual issue whether the coffee was unreasonably hot, thereby defeating summary judgment on design defect. Since the design defect was upheld thereby the failure-to-warn claim would stand as the arguments of intervening and superseding causation would not apply.
6. Do you agree with this decision? Why or why not? (5 points)
Answer: I agree with the affirmed decision on the breach of warranty claim. The decision I disagree with it where the court reverses the summary judgment regarding the design defect. Coffee in my experience varies vastly in the temperatures they serve it at, even my home coffee maker settings can be at one hundred seventy degrees, whether that would cause second degree burns or not I’m not sure. I do know when I make the mistake of taking a large drink to soon of any coffee purchases anywhere I burn my tongue, it seems that is a forseeable and just common sense matter that you would be careful with hot coffee as if it can burn your tongue or in this case was too hot for the grandmother to drink caution should have been taken. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How to Shepardize the Nadel et al. v. Burger King Corp. & Emil, Inc. case:

Week 3 Homework case (there are 8 questions total):

A. The name and citation of the case (5 points) –
Answer: Angelina and Jack McMahon, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Bunn-O-Matic Corporation, James River Paper Company, and Wincup Holdings, L.P., Defendants
McMahon v. Bunn-O-Matic, ---F.3d--- (1998 WL 351294, 7th Cir.)

B. The name of the court which decided the case (3 points)
Answer: United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit

C. The year of the decision (2 points)
Answer: 1998

D. The facts of the case (5 points)
Answer: Angelina McMahon received third-degree burns when she spilled take-out coffee in her lap. She did this when she was transferring the coffee from one takeout cup to another, where the smaller cup she believes collapsed due to being made poorly or the heat from the coffee. She sued Bunn, the maker of the coffee machine used at the restaurant and the maker of the paper cup.

E. The issue of the case (5 points)
Answer: The McMahon’s then sued for design defect and failure to warn. The McMahon’s asserted that Bunn was liable for injuries due to their failure to warn consumers about the severity of burns that can occur from the heat of the coffee served from their coffee makers thus resulting in a design defect that produced an unreasonably dangerous product. McMahon v. Bunn-O-Matic, ---F.3d--- (1998 WL 351294, 7th Cir.)

F. The “decision” of the case (5 points)
Answer: Judgment was affirmed in favor of the coffee maker manufacturer. The court held there was no duty to warn when the coffee was not unusually hot as the consumer has general knowledge that coffee is served hot. The ruling was on design defect was the expert opinion was not based on facts or data and therefore not supportable evidence.

G. For what principle of law was the Nadel case used (cited for) in the case? (5 points) To find the answer to this question, use the Find feature in Word and search for Nadel. Just copy and paste what the case cites from Nadel as your response to this question.

Answer: The magistrate judge observed that both McMahons conceded during their depositions that "hotness" was one of the elements they value in coffee and that they sought out hot coffee, knew it could burn, and took precautions as a result. These concessions--which any adult coffee drinker is bound to make--foreclose the possibility of recovery, the opinion concluded. Other, similar suits have come to the same summary end, see Barnett v. Leiserv, Inc., 968 F. Supp. 690 (N.D. Ga.), affirmed without opinion, 137 F.3d 1356 (11th Cir. 1997); Greene v. Boddie-Noell Enterprises, Inc., 966 F. Supp. 416 (W.D. Va. 1997); Lamkin v. Braniff Airlines, Inc., 853 F. Supp. 30 (D. Mass. 1994); [**7] Oubre v. E-Z Serve Corp., 1998 La. App. LEXIS 1392 (5th Cir. 1998); Huppe v. Twenty-First Century Restaurants of America, Inc., 130 Misc. 2d 736, 497 N.Y.S.2d 306 (Sup. Ct. 1985), although one published opinion has held that a claim of this sort is triable, see Nadel v. Burger King Corp., 1997 Ohio App. LEXIS 2144 (1st Dist.), review denied, 80 Ohio St. 3d 1415, 684 N.E.2d 706 (1997), and a suit in New Mexico (Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants, P.T.S., Inc.) produced a widely publicized jury verdict of some $ 3 million but not a published opinion (the case was settled before appeal).
H. Submit a copy of the Shepardized Case (the case you used to answer questions A-G)(this is worth 10 points)