The Truth About the McDonald’s Spilled Coffee Case

As attorneys who represent plaintiffs, we’re often asked for our perspective on the infamous McDonald’s spilled hot coffee case. You’ve probably heard the story — a woman spilled hot coffee on her lap, sued, and a jury suggested damages in the millions of dollars. The case, even two decades later, remains a symbol to many of outrageous, frivolous lawsuits.

A one-sentence outline does make the case seem ridiculous, but the details—the real story—tell a completely different, sobering tale. Understanding these details is critical to understanding why a jury of six men and six women, after seven grueling days of expert testimony from both sides, was so incensed by McDonald’s behavior that they recommended $2.9 million in damages.

In 1992, Stella Lieback, a 79-year-old widow and retired department store clerk, bought a 49-cent cup of McDonald’s coffee at a drive-thru. She had no sense that this would be a defining moment for the legal community’s reputation. Mrs. Lieback had never sued anyone or any company before. She simply opened the coffee to put in cream and sugar, then accidentally spilled the hot liquid onto her lap where it pooled around her groin and buttocks.

A McDonald’s manual and independent tests would later suggest the liquid was hot – very hot, in fact, at 180 to 190 degrees. An expert testified that third degree burns happen quickly at those temperatures — three seconds for liquids at 190 degrees and 12-15 seconds for liquids at 180 degrees.

Mrs. Lieback knows these facts in a more intimate way. The coffee burned 16% of her body; 6% were third degree burns. She spent seven days in the hospital. Photos reveal gruesome injuries. Doctors took skin from the length of her thigh to graft her wounds. Mrs. Lieback was not the first person to experience severe burns due to McDonald’s coffee. During testimony, a McDonald’s executive said he knew that the company’s coffee caused severe burns but that corporate officials had no intention of changing the company’s mandated 180-190 degree coffee temperatures. In internal company documents, McDonald’s recorded 700 people with coffee-induced burns in the decade preceding the trial. The fast food chain regularly settled these coffee burn cases, sometimes for more than $500,000.

Why McDonald’s refused to turn down the coffee temperature is murky. Testimony and internal documents suggest that the cost of settling was comparatively negligible. McDonald’s focus group testing had found very hot coffee compensated for taste.

McDonald’s decided not to settle Mrs. Lieback’s case. The company was initially asked by Mrs. Lieback to cover her medical costs. McDonald’s representatives refused. Repeatedly, as the case continued to trial, McDonald’s officials were asked to settle by Mrs. Lieback’s representatives and, later, by the judge. McDonald’s declined those settlement offers.

Mrs. Lieback, in an interview, later said, “I was not in it for the money. I was in it because I wanted them to bring the temperature down so that other people would not go through the same thing as I did.”

The jury found McDonald’s “callous and indifferent by not turning down the temperature.”  The official finding was that the chain had engaged in willful, reckless, malicious or wanton conduct. Jurors set a compensatory award of $200,000, lowered to $160,000 in light of Mrs. Lieback’s own role. To send a message to McDonald’s, the jury recommended punitive damages equaling two days of McDonald’s coffee sales: $2.7 million.

The judge did not follow the jury’s recommendation. McDonald’s eventually settled for less than $500,000. Today, McDonald’s manuals mandate a temperature that is ten degrees lower.

The attorneys for Mrs. Lieback saw in her case what we so often see in ours: someone who fairly deserves redress for a terrible situation. We too would have been proud to represent her, as we do all our plaintiffs. It took integrity and perseverance—values we hold dear—to help an elderly woman win a case against a powerful, multi-billion dollar global company.