pepsi hit with 1.26 billion dollar default judgment

[deadrats]

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Price-to-PepsiCo-for-Not-law-3214509113.html?x=0&.v=1

What's the cost of not showing up to court? For PepsiCo Inc., it's a $1.26 billion default judgment. A Wisconsin state court socked the company with the monster award in a case alleging that PepsiCo stole the idea to bottle and sell purified water from two Wisconsin men.

Now the company is scrambling to salvage the situation. The damages award was handed down on Sept. 30. PepsiCo filed motions to vacate the order and dismiss the claims on Oct. 13, saying it wasn't even aware of the lawsuit until Oct. 6.

this is one of those stories that just makes me way WTF?!? none of it makes any sense, pepsi claims that it wasn't aware of the lawsuit until after the default judgment was already handed down but that is not 100 percent true, a legal secretary was aware of it well in advance yet for all practical purposes ignored it, attorneys for pepsi distributors filed answers to the suit and appeared in court to defend the suit, the plaintiffs followed the letter of the law and showed up in court on the day they were supposed to and the law allows for default judgments when one party ignores a court date.

on the other hand the lawsuit is for such a ridiculous thing, the claim that those 2 had the idea for bottled water and pepsi "stole" the idea is preposterous, you can't "steal" an idea, you can only copy it. furthermore this suit asks the court to accept the notion that the only 2 people in the world that were capable of imagining putting water in a bottle and selling it was the plaintiffs, a truly silly claim.

lastly, if this judgment stands its not like the money is coming out of the company's pocket, pepsi will just raise the prices on their products to make up for the lose, so in the end it's the public that ends up footing the bill.

[bendixG15]

When I read the story, my first thought was that it was just written for sensationalism and not for accuracy.

Here is the real culprit, the byline is by ......
Lynne Marek, The National Law Journal