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Bill Miller Bar-B-Q, headquartered in San Antonio, TX, has been found liable for serving a customer 189-degree barbeque sauce causing second-degree burns when the woman spilled the sauce on her legs in May 2023. The jury ruled Miller must pay $2.8 million for the plaintiff’s pain and suffering.
According to Genesis Monita, who was 18 and in high school, she ordered breakfast tacos from the San Antonio Miller Bar-B-Q location and then parked in the Miller parking lot to eat her food. She said the container that the barbeque sauce was served in was hot to the touch, and she dropped it on her legs, causing severe burns that required medical attention, according to Fox San Antonio. Monita’s suit also alleged the Miller location did the same thing two years earlier and did nothing about it. Monita asked for more than $1 million in damages.
Monita’s case went to trial in January, and at the trial, the jury learned Miller Bar-B-Q offered to pay her medical bill, cover lost wages, and pay to clean her car, but she declined. Monica’s suit alleged she missed work and suffered depression and isolation.
According to Fox Business, Miller’s policy says the sauce should be no more than 165 degrees, but when Monita’s accident happened, her sauce was 189 degrees, and serving the sauce was grossly negligent, the suit said.
“No one has ever apologized to me, even to this day, no one has ever apologized to me, you know they just shook my hand, have a good day, but I have not received an apology from them,” Monita said after the verdict was reached.
“At Bill Miller’s, the sauce is always hot.”
According to Miller’s defense attorney, however, Miller’s serves their sauce at a minimum not a maximum of 165 degrees to comply with food safety regulations. Further, Monita had eaten the sauce several times before, and it was always the same temperature.
“At Bill Miller’s, the sauce is always hot, and our customers know that. And that’s why it’s hot,” Miller’s attorney, Barry McClenahan, said in court, according to Law & Crime. “What would we have warned Ms. Monita of that she did not already know?” (According to Law & Crime, Texas regulations state food should be served at a minimum of 135 degrees, not 165, as lawyers in the case claimed.)
After just two hours of deliberation, the jury ruled Miller’s Bar-B-Q was negligent and must pay $25,000 for Monita’s medical bills, $900,000 for the depression and isolation caused by the accident, and $1.9 million in punitive damages.
Corporate versus personal responsibility
The Monita case boiled down — pun intended — to corporate versus personal responsibility, as online comments about Monita’s verdict point out, similar to the infamous 1992 case, Liebeck v. McDonald’s, when then 79-year-old Stella Liebeck spilled McDonald’s coffee in her lap causing third-degree burns, and the fast food chain was found liable.
“Sad day for common sense and personal accountability,” one comment said that disagreed with the ruling in Monita’s favor. But another comment added in part, “I think we need to have faith in our legal system and our public servants on the jury that they made the right decision. 12 people decided that she deserved more than what was requested in less than 2 hours. There are surely facts in the case that we are not aware of.”