Let me preface this post by saying that I have many friends who are attorneys. They are decent, honest, salt-of-the-earth people to whom I am not referring in this particular tirade about lawyers. That being said...

While the U.S. has set the standard for how a free society can prosper if the rule of law to which we all must adhere is based upon common sense legal standards, this story exemplifies the inherent problems we have under the current civil/tort system...

MIAMI (AP) - A second woman is suing wine and spirit maker Bacardi, claiming she was seriously burned by flaming rum during a night out in Miami.
A friend who was with her has already sued the company.

The women say they suffered serious burns after being hit by the flaming rum, and claim one of Bacardi's products is defective and dangerous. The lawsuits are filed in Miami-Dade County Circuit Court.

A bartender, who wasn't identified in either lawsuit, was pouring shots of Bacardi 151 when a customer lit a menu on fire and placed it in the stream of alcohol. The lawsuits say the bottle turned into a flame thrower and sent flaming rum everywhere.
The Miami-based company says it won't comment on the suits, but that the product is clearly labeled with warnings against setting fire to it.

Shouldn't they be suing the customer who lit a menu on fire? It is neither the bar's fault, nor the bartender's fault, nor the rum manufacturer's fault that some idiot set a fire in a crowded bar where flammables are being consumed.

This is exactly like suing the bullet manufacturer if a guy cleaning his loaded gun, carelessly pulls the trigger and shoots somebody.

You get one guess to answer why the lawyers are suing Bacardi........give up? Because neither the bar, the bartender, nor the idiot customer with the menu have enough money to make it worthwhile for the attorney to bother suing. The lawyer will drag his poor, disfigured client into court (that is unless he can extort millions in a settlement from Bacardi who wishes to avoid an expensive trial) and cry in front of the jury that his client was the victim of improper alcohol content, or reckless bottle design, or some such nonsense. The jury will look at the poor girl who will be weeping and bandaged, even though she won't need bandages at that point, and they, having abandoned all common sense, will agree that she deserves something for her pain and suffering. After all, Bacardi is a huge company, they don't need a couple of million dollars. So the jury will award her 3 million dollars and the lawyer will smile and gladly take his $1million share of the award.

What will have happened? The lawyer, a John Edwards clone no doubt, will have raped the legal system and stolen money that neither he nor his client deserved. He will have convinced, through distortion, 12 idiots that somehow Bacardi bears responsibility for the recklessness of that person with the menu.

It's time for tort reform in this country. Lawyers should not be allowed to extort money from businesses by threatening expensive law suits, and if that fails, mislead 12 ignoramouses into believing something about that business that isn't true, without some sort of check and balance.

These tort lawyers are like a bunch of kids standing on the sidewalk throwing rocks at passing cars. There are no penalties for hitting and damaging the cars, but if you get lucky and can cause a wreck, you get to grab all the money from the wallets of the bleeding passengers.

There are currently few if any penalties for extorting settlement money from businesses with frivolous or phony law suits. Shouldn't there be?