Man Blames Dell Laptop for House Fire

A Florida man has leaped onto the Dell laptop explosion bandwagon by claiming his house was burnt to a crisp because a Dell laptop ignited his couch on fire. At about 5 a.m. Louis Minnear awoke to the smell of an electrical fire, after quickly surveying his house and finding nothing, he went back to bed. Forty-five minutes later he was awoken again, except this time to his couch on fire.

The story gets a little odder. Minnear quickly led his family out of the house and began making trips in an out saving what valuables he could before the flame got too big. Conveniently two of the family members—Minnear's oldest sons—were staying with other family at the time of the fire. The fire marshal ahs been called in for an investigation to find the true cause of the fire, but Minnear insists it was the Dell laptop that he conveniently knew was left on the couch sitting on papers.

The most notable belongings lost was a collection of 843 DVDs, according to the family. Holy damn, who knows exactly how many DVDs you own, especially if it is over 800. Something seems a little fishy about this story. These exploding Dell laptop batteries are becoming the new McDonalds hot coffee. – Travis Hudson

Man blames Dell laptop for house fire [Herald Tribune]

12:52 PM on Mon Aug 21 2006
By Travis Hudson
1,876 views
23 comments

Comments

rainfever at 12:01 PM on 08/21/06
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Holy damn, who knows exactly how many DVDs you own, especially if it is over 800. Something seems a little fishy about this story.

Well I dunno, I have 1269 DVD's. Or were we not counting porn?
doofusgumby at 12:12 PM on 08/21/06
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JEEBUS. "These exploding Dell laptop batteries are becoming the new McDonalds hot coffee" The uninformed assumptions of the masses. GAH!

"Stella Liebeck had bought a 49-cent cup of coffee at the drive-in window of an Albuquerque McDonald's, and while removing the lid to add cream and sugar had spilled it, causing third-degree burns of the groin, inner thighs and buttocks. Her suit, filed in state court in Albuquerque, claimed the coffee was "defective" because it was so hot.

What the jury didn't realize initially was the severity of her burns. Told during the trial of Mrs. Liebeck's seven days in the hospital and her skin grafts, and shown gruesome photographs, jurors began taking the matter more seriously. "It made me come home and tell my wife and daughters don't drink coffee in the car, at least not hot," says juror Jack Elliott.

Even more eye-opening was the revelation that McDonald's had seen such injuries many times before. Company documents showed that in the past decade McDonald's had received at least 700 reports of coffee burns ranging from mild to third degree, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000.

Some observers wonder why McDonald's, after years of settling coffee-burn cases, chose to take this one to trial. After all, the plaintiff was a sympathetic figure - an articulate, 81-year-old former department store clerk who said under oath that she had never filed suit before. In fact, she said, she never would have filed this one if McDonald's hadn't dismissed her requests for compensation for pain and medical bills with an offer of $800."

Nice continuation of the neocon "tort reform" agenda there, Travis.

http://www.vanosteen.com/mcdonalds-coffee-lawsuit.htm
ReductiMat at 12:14 PM on 08/21/06
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No doubt his Rembrandt, Picasso and large collection of Faberge eggs were lost in the fire too.
combat chuck at 12:20 PM on 08/21/06
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Judging by the look of the house, I highly doubt this guy had a laptop of any kind. I live in Florida, and houses like this one typically only contain small livestock, stray cats, a rusty mimeograph machine, and maybe an alligator.
nzruss at 12:27 PM on 08/21/06
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This was the house before the fire... note the cattle as Combat chuck quite correctly pointed out.
detroityianni at 12:31 PM on 08/21/06
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cant wait to see how this is gonna turn out.. what this jack ass dosent realize is after an investigation it will pinpoint the cause of the fire and that poured gas all over his dell laptop
masteryoda at 12:41 PM on 08/21/06
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Lol this was bound to happen and we have another crazy million dollar lawsuit
masteryoda at 12:43 PM on 08/21/06
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Some of the whackiest lawsuits ever

http://www.duhaime.org/Law_fun/lawsuit.aspx
njbrideau at 12:44 PM on 08/21/06
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by the looks of that house, this guy had all his assets tied up in those 843 DVDs.
rainfever at 12:53 PM on 08/21/06
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lol @ nzruss and njbrideau

*high five*
dune at 01:08 PM on 08/21/06
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That does sound a little opportunistic.

But McDonalds coffee really is hot:

"By corporate specifications, McDonald's sells its coffee at 180 to 190 degrees Fahrenheit;"

"During discovery, McDonalds produced documents showing more than 700 claims by people burned by its coffee between 1982 and 1992. Some claims
involved third-degree burns substantially similar to Liebecks. This history documented McDonalds' knowledge about the extent and nature of this hazard."

http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm
http://www.centerjd.org/free/mythbusters-free/MB_mcdonalds...
sdfjkl at 01:16 PM on 08/21/06
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I'm not saying the story doesn't sound fishy, but when someone owns that many DVDs it seems likely that he's a collector. Those tend to care alot about their collections and spend considerable time organizing them - thus it's MORE likely that someone with 800+ DVDs knows the exact number than someone with 30.
mtopper at 01:33 PM on 08/21/06
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in which room of this elegant abode do we think he stored 800+ DVDs - the library, the theater or the den?
Saboteur at 01:56 PM on 08/21/06
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It was in the 1200 Sqft mudroom, south wall of course doesn't everybody?
davidm at 01:59 PM on 08/21/06
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Wow, love to read all the shallow, judgemental comments. So droll.

Yes, people in small houses don't own computers. Only people in big, fancy houses own computers.

Hmmn, I wonder what kind of effort and incentives it takes to make it so laptop batteries stop having serious problems.

I say we let manufacturers shovel out whatever sh*t they have lying around that can make a buck, and if someone happens upon something defective, it must be their fault! Yee-haww.

Anyway, thanks guys for adding those facts about the McDonalds case, maybe some people will start to think there's more than one way to look at a story.
someToast at 02:03 PM on 08/21/06
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Thank you doofusgumby... was just heading out for the same data.

So tired of that case being trotted out as an example of frivolous lawsuits.
jeffj-nj at 02:34 PM on 08/21/06
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I almost have to wonder if people mention the McDonald's coffee thing just to annoy me personally. Thanks to those of you who let me know I'm not alone, and especially to you, doofusgumby, for trying to spread the facts; it's an uphill battle, though... you know that, don't you? For every one person out there with a clue about that case, there's probably a dozen or so without. Sigh. It's like everyone forgets we have juries. 12 people decided that outcome. Can we consider, just for a moment, that those people might've had more info than the rest of us? =/
HappyApple at 03:06 PM on 08/21/06
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Maybe it was his iScorch that did it?

www.iScorch.com

happyapple
doofusgumby at 03:07 PM on 08/21/06
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jeffj-nj - yeah, the "tort reformers" can't point to any real cases of abuse so they twist the facts, or leave out the important bits. Or just keep re-forwarding all them fictitious lawsuit stories like the one about the old lady who confused "cruise control" with "autopilot" on her new winnebago. (see http://www.snopes.com legal section. very funny stuff)
kmanfactor at 04:58 PM on 08/21/06
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Maybe I don't know all the facts, but it sounds like she wanted to put cremer/sugar/whatever in her coffee while in the car. Sounds like negligence on her part, hot coffee or not.
CptMystic at 05:56 PM on 08/21/06
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doofusgumby -
So, because I can't think of the conifiguration of atoms in any molecules, does that mean they don't exist? Does you or anyone else *saying* there's no such thing as a frivolous lawsuit make it true? Do you seriously believe no one ever commits fraud in cases like this? If so, I have a bowl of Wendy's chili for you.

After about a half hour of net research (and recalling from personal memory), here are a few that I think of as frivolous:
- the iPod battery lawsuit (now I'm going to have a plethora of Apple fanboys come down on my head)
- Any of the lawsuits against game companies because their software doesn't run 100% perfect, under any and all conditions (particularly suits by users who continue to play the games anyway)
- The class action suit against Netflix (from the Snopes legal section)...I'm a Netflix subscriber, and if I feel impacted by their behavior, I will not sue them - I will CANCEL MY SUBSCRIPTION. This is how a free market economy works. Vote with your dollars, people.
- The wrongful death case of the golfer's estate against Diamond Shamrock Chemical Company (again from Snopes, thanks for the reminder about it as a source). Moral of the story: don't put stuff in your mouth that isn't meant to be there. Golf tees are not candy.
- Class action and other suits against tobacco companies for the health hazards of smoking (like the one from the Marlboro man, also noted on Snopes). Now, I am avidly anti-smoking (in fact, smoking arguably killed both my mother and her mother), but it has been fairly well known for DECADES that smoking is bad for your health. Every package of cigarettes is clearly labeled, denoting the link between smoking and its associated health hazards. People smoke anyway (and, I'm afraid, always will). No one is *forced* to smoke, however.

Now of course, I don't know whether this guy's claim is true or not. If a Dell laptop battery really burned the guy's house down, he *may* have a case (I say may because it may be possible - you must admit - that he purposefully constructed the scenario after hearing about the defective batteries, since that story has been all over the news). Net result is that this one's not a frivolous suit in any case - it's either legitimate, or it's fraud.
doofusgumby at 04:09 AM on 08/22/06
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Steve Coalier: WTF? who the hell mentioned atoms & molecules?? and, if those suits you've mentioned have any merit or not, why didn't you link them? I'm not going to bother looking, provide links.

and you forget about the malfeasance of the tobacco companies that led to all them multi-billion dollar judgements, dude.

Shorter Steve Coalier: "I'm an idiot".
CptMystic at 03:03 PM on 08/22/06
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Hmmm...at least I'm not hiding behind an anonymous tag, or name-calling.

Since you didn't get my analogy, let me explain it for you. A chemist or a physicist might know all about the atoms in a molecule from memory - a layman would not. This does not mean the atoms don't exist. Just like a layman might not be able to recite frivolous lawsuits from memory. That does not mean such lawsuits don't exist or are not frivilous. Get it?

Side note: I'm still on the fence about the McDonald's case. I am sad for Stella's injury, sure, but no one at McDonald's poured it in her lap - that was an accident, see? If she had just bought a knife and dropped that in her lap and severed an artery, would the knife company be liable? Of course not. Was the top on the cup defective? Well, no - she purposefully removed it, with the cup (which I'm sure was noticably hot even from the outside) suspended dangerously over her tender bits. Yes, 700+ other people had similar accidents, among *millions* of McDonald's customers. McDonald's didn't pour the coffee on them, either.

Three of the five of the cases I mentioned were from Snopes, which *you* gave the link for, but whatever:
Marlboro case - http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/marlboro.htm
Ultima Online case - http://pc.ign.com/articles/066/066277p1.html
Netflix case - http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/nothing/netflix.asp
Golf tee case - http://www.snopes.com/horrors/poison/golftee.asp
iPod case - http://www.ipodobserver.com/story/24424

Here's a few more examples of frivolous suits - with links - that I'll throw in for no extra charge:
http://www.mrcranky.com/movies/40daysand40nights/100.html<...
http://www.lawcore.com/legal-information/04-18-06.html
http://www.ferrago.com/portal/click/?id=59690
http://promomagazine.com/news/bkfrancisees_lawsuit2_091305...
http://members.fortunecity.com/iandavies/262.htm
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/n...
http://cbs2chicago.com/local/local_story_226195718.html
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/local/story.asp?ID=83597
http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_070606_news_jord...
http://spartacus.blogs.com/spartacus/2005/08/rock_climbing...

So...what am I leaving out? Which facts am I twisting?

Also, speaking of links...where's the links for the tobacco company malfeasance? Is the malfeasance the direct cause of the health issues, or does it perhaps merit a separate suit?