The world is full of craziness
By Staff
Leada Gore, Editor
In case you were wondering, this world is full of nutty people.
I don't mean people with serious mental illnesses. Your heart goes out to those people. What I'm talking about is otherwise ordinary people who, for whatever reason, do something ridiculous, crazy or just plain dumb.
For example, I covered a story one time where a lady left the gasoline nozzle in her car as she drove off from the station. While it luckily caused no explosion, it did cause a big mess. Then, just a week later, the same lady did the same thing at the same gas station.
Unbelievable.
Or, the stories I've written – yes, there's been more than one – where someone calls the police to report someone stole their drugs from them.
Unbelievable.
But as weird as these things are, they don't really compare to the story of the Honorable Roy Pearson.
Pearson is an administrative law judge in Washington, D.C. Earlier this year, he took some cleaning into Custom Cleaners. Custom Cleaners, own by Soo Chung, Jin Name Chung and Ki Y Chung, had a "satisfaction guaranteed" sign hanging in the window.
When Pearson returned to pick up his dry cleaning, he said the Chungs lost a pair of his pants. He later said they tried to give him a pair that weren't his. Feeling this entire thing violated the "satisfaction guaranteed" Pearson decided to sue.
And sue he did. Pearson filed suit for some $54 million over the pair of pants, claiming the dry cleaners violated the Consumer Protection Act. This amount was reasonable, Pearson alleged, not because the pants were anything special but because the "satisfaction guaranteed" sign was unreasonable and the shop owners had been violating this policy for years.
The $54 million pants case hit the news shows and became another example of how people can abuse our legal system. This week, however, the judicial system redeemed itself when it ruled against Pearson and ordered him to pay the defendant's court costs.
The defendants said they were relieved with the judgement and said the case had taken an enormous toll on their business. I don't know if Pearson himself had anything to say, but I bet the next time he brings his pants to a dry cleaner, the business owner shows him the door.
I don't know Mr. Pearson so I can't comment too much on his motives, reasoning ability or even sanity. What I do know is there's a lady somewhere who is driving off with a gas nozzle in her car who's looking for you to get some advice on dry cleaning.
Nuts.
