From the local news yesterday, here is McDonald’s grasping for straws in an attempt to cover their backsides in a lawsuit. First, a bit of a primer. Someone was playing hoaxes on local McDonald’s that entailed employees being detained, strip searched, and sexually assaulted. McDonald’s knew about it and didn’t go public with it, but told the managers of the other area stores. The manager at this particular store didn’t pass along the word to her assistant managers because she “thought Donna and Kim wouldn’t be dumb enough to fall for it.” Well, they were, and it resulted in 3.5 hours of sexual assault for Louise Ogborn, who is suing McDonald’s for the (ridiculous) sum of over $200 million.

So what is McDonald’s defense? This pretty much say it all:

“It’s not the ideal way to come to new growth, but some people grow through their trauma,” forensic psychologist Alan Friedman testified in Bullitt Circuit Court, where Ogborn has sued the company for more than $200 million in damages.

Friedman, who was paid more than $58,850 by McDonald’s, said a battery of tests and his interview with the former McDonald’s employee show she is more assertive and self-reliant than she was before her April 9, 2004, ordeal, though on cross-examination he acknowledged the tests are new and haven’t been well-validated.

Yep, that’s right. They hired a “forensic psychologist” to come into the courtroom and venture awfully close to saying, “she’s better off now than she was before.” Sure, he’s technically right that people grow through their trauma. But you don’t say that in a courtroom. How heartless do you have to be to say “I’m sure it was traumatic, but she’s grown from it,” rather than just saying “we goofed, we have put the following measures in place to ensure that something of this type never happens again, and we apologize for the damage that was done to Ms. Ogborn. Unfortunately we can’t undo what has been done, but we’re going to compensate Ms. Ogborn in the only way we can with a payment of $20 million (or 50 or 75 or a lifetime of Big Macs or whatever).” But if that was the mentality, the case would have never gone to court. The CEO would have called Ms. Ogborn and said “I’m very sorry. Let’s come to an agreement to compensate you.”

Friedman, a forensic psychologist from Chicago, said he wasn’t telling the jury that Ogborn was “better off” because of what happened to her. But he said that she reported that because of it she feels closer to others, is more willing to express her emotions, and has found “a new path for her life.”

Maybe I’m misreading that, but it sure sounds like he was saying she’s better off. If he’s not saying that, he’s at least saying that she’s no worse off because of her “new growth”. I’m not on the jury. But if I were, that right there would have cost McDonald’s a lot of money. That shows the absolutely heartless, unfeeling mentality that fuels this corporation. The nearly $60,000 that they paid Mr. Friedman to give that testimony could have gone towards an out-of-court settlement with Ogborn, which quite likely wouldn’t have been in the hundreds of millions. Instead, they will not end up paying many millions of dollars. While I’m typically against outrageous sums of money in lawsuits, given their attitude towards the whole thing, I hope they pay out the nose.


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