That Happened!

New York - McDonald’s is being sued for three million dollars by a man and his wife.

Phillip Sherman left behind his cell phone in a Fayetteville McDonald’s in July. Fayetteville is located in the state of Arkansas.

The cell phone that Mr. Sherman left behind at the McDonald’s contained nude photographs of his wife. The racy photos were later posted online where everyone could view them. This is a very serious issue because this is someone’s private photographs being displayed on the Internet without their permission.

Phillip Sherman called the McDonald’s to speak to a manager about his lost phone. The manager told him that they would hold on to his cell phone until he would be able to come and pick it up.

However, before Mr. Sherman could go and retrieve the cell phone, his wife received threatening text messages and phone calls. The racy photographs of his wife had been posted online along with personal information about Mr. Sherman and his wife.

This action caused the couple to decide to sue McDonald’s, Mathews Management Company which owns the Fayetteville franchise, and Aaron Brummley who is the restaurant’s manager.

The couple is suing for $3-million in damages. The damages are for suffering, embarrassment, and the cost of moving.

McDonald’s has faced another high profile lawsuit. In 1994, a New Mexico woman was burned after spilling a hot cup of coffee from the company. The woman’s name was Stella Liebeck. She was originally awarded 2.86 million dollars in damages but the judge reduced the damages and the matter was finally settled between the parties out of court.

This is a very serious issue that McDonald’s is facing. It is obvious that an employee at McDonald’s took Mr. Sherman’s cell phone. The employee must have examined the photographs and the personal information that was inside of the phone.

This shows a total lack of professionalism at McDonald’s. Mr. Sherman had informed the restaurant manager, Mr. Brummley that he was going to retrieve his cell phone. Mr. Brummley should have put the cell phone away for safe keeping. If Mr. Brummley himself did not post the nude photographs of Mr. Sherman’s wife online then he must have lost custody of the cell phone at some point in time.

This was a huge invasion of privacy on McDonald’s part. Mr. Sherman’s wife received threatening text messages and phone calls. The couple’s personal information was also posted online with the nude photographs. This poses a threat to the couple’s safety.

McDonald’s needs to have a stricter policy about lost items for their employees to follow. Employees should know that they cannot look at anyone’s personal property unless they are trying to find out who the item belongs to. Employees need to ask themselves the question, if you would not like racy photographs of yourself posted online, then why would you do it to someone else?

Of course the whole situation could have been avoided if Tina never emailed her husband the racy photos.