WalMart sues brain-damaged woman for medical expenses

My impression, though it is not clear in the story, is that the woman is no longer covered by Wal-Mart's insurance.

So Wal-Mart and it's insurer were made whole, the trucking company is off the hook, the victim and her family have to scrape up $51,000 so that Wal-Mart can keep it's doors open and I assume the American public will pay for the care of the brain-damaged woman for the rest of her life.

I get teary-eyed when everything works just according to plan.

 

You forgot her attorney who walked off with $300,000.

 

I didn't want to give ambulance chasers a bad name.

 

I'm going to have to agree with Boom here (I think that's a first!).

But there definitely seems to be several things missing in this story too - like is Walmart getting the money, or its insurance company.

It's also weird about the accident - I was in an accident once (someone else's fault), and my health insurance never paid a cent, it came out of car insurance. I had to go to the emergency room, I had a concussion and hurt my back, basically. I had to go to physical therapy for the back.

And we went into litigation, and settled without going to court, and the settlement went to me (the hospital fees and physical therapy fees were already paid). And the lawyers basically used a formula, about 5x the medical expenses, I think, to decide how much I (and everyone else that was involved) got.

It came to like $16,000 for me, the lawyer got about 4 or 5 thousand, and I got the rest.

So I think this lady's lawyer sucked - he should have been about to get at least a million or 2 for this if her medical bills were already up to $400,000 (and counting).

 

I had a wreck and my health insurance didn't cover a portion of the medical expenses since I got a settlement.
I think that is kind of standard.
Basically, it is like getting paid twice for the same thing.
It really sucks in this deal, because the case is so high profile, the amount of damage caused by the bad feelings are way more than the amount of money Wal-Mart received.
But if they had let it slide, it sets a precedent and then when it happens again, and with a company as big as Wal-Mart, it will.
Would they could have done is taken the money, but then worked something out through Wal-Mart's foundation so she still had the funds to pay for her care or use this as a jumping off point to start a catastrophic injury fund for Wal-Mart employees since it appears that they don't have one.
Even Gannett, evil, evil Gannett, has an employee fund for injuries and natural disasters.

 

There is one missing piece here that I would like to know more about. The lawyer put the settlement in a trust for the lady and told Walmart funds were not directly going to her so she would not be responsbile to pay back insurance.

To me it seems like he was trying to pull fast one. Walmart may have thought this as well

 

If she were a corporation like Bear Stearns, she would be getting a $400 million check so that the rest of us wouldn't be so demoralized by the situation that we stop spending our money on flat screen TVs.

Instead, another carcass for the pile of discarded humanity.

 

here is sadest part of this whole story - while she was recovering her youngest son was killed in Iraq.

 

OK, I guess that's two then.

 

http://online.wSportsJournalists.com/article/SB120708739471181553.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Wal-Mart dropped the lawsuit.

 

Golly gee willikers.

I guess Wal-Mart didn't really have to do go through with their legal and rational stance because of the letter of the law, obligation to insurance providers, fairness to other employees, etc., etc.

Apologies and cash now being accepted.