Girl awarded $800,000 in damages for 'dangerously hot' McDonald's burn injury
By India Today World Desk: An eight-year-old girl in Florida was awarded $800,000 in damages after she suffered severe burn injuries when a McDonald’s Chicken McNugget fell on her leg.
According to a report with the BBC, the girl’s family had sought $15m in damages after the ‘dangerously hot’ McNugget burnt the minor, identified as Olivia Caraballo.
The incident happened in 2019, when Olivia was four years old.
The Chicken McNugget fell on her leg, leaving a scar, after she had opened her Happy Meal in the car at a McDonald’s drive-thru in Tamarac, near Fort Lauderdale in Florida.
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The Florida jury awarded compensation to Olivia, based on the pain, suffering and mental anguish she suffered.
The compensation included $400,000 for the past four years as well as $400,000 for the future.
The decision came after the family’s lawyers shared photos of the burn, along with an audio of the minor’s screams the moment McNugget fell on her leg.
In defense, McDonald’s had argued the family should receive $156,000 because, they claimed, her pain ended after the burn healed in three weeks.
The lawyer for the outlet also said the girl was still going to McDonald’s, getting chicken nuggets.
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Meanwhile, terming the legal decision ‘momentous’, the minor girl’s mother told US media outside court that she was “just happy”.
She further said she had no expectations and that this was fair.
Commenting on her daughter’s burn injury and the scar, she said that Olivia was willing to get it removed.